Confined, Corralled, Constrained!

Confined, corralled, constrained. There is a time where we are subdued by the hand of the Lord. In this time, we must submit with our heart willingly and obediently to His hand. You cannot bypass this step if you long to serve the Lord. Those who are destined to move In Him will be confined, corralled and constrained by His hand for a season.

Bill Britton in his article - "The Harness of the Lord" says this:

"God is dealing with inward rebellion of our wills which must be brought into absolute and complete surrender to the will of our Lord."

What can I say about this time in my life? I am sure if  you are reading this, you also have a distinct testimony of your time of constraint. It is not a pleasant time while you are going through, but in hindsight, I would not have it any other way. During this time, my flesh was so strong and my pain was so great. The tension pulled me between two places. With all my heart I wanted to submit but with all my heart I did not want to submit. I wanted the process to be easier that it was so I could join the "mix" - those I saw all around me moving forward, seemingly oblivious to the pain I found myself in and the process I found myself in. God got down to the distinct motives of my heart not letting anything go. What others could seemingly do, I could not. Not only could I not do what I wanted, I could not justify or explain why it seemed that I was forsaken and forgotten with no anointing and no plan in my life. I sat in silence many times, moving around the corral with fury and vengeance, wanting out at any moment.

I would even pretend that I wholeheartedly accepted this place but God saw deep into my heart. The words that I was speaking did not  match up with what was going on inside of me. There was an inward rebellion that I justified in so many ways and questioned in so many other ways. I wanted out as quickly as possible.

But as the years went by, I did not get out. The promises seemed dim and forgotten and my hope started to wane to the point of losing hope. The corral seemed like a prison to me and a place of pain and sorrow. I wanted out.

Every time I started to compare myself to those outside of this place I found myself in, I lost hope. I saw people running to conferences, moving forward in networking and ministry, going at a breakneck speed and then smiling at me as they went by. Many times I tried to stop those walking or running by my corral and tried to explain some things to them.

I would shout "Hey how are you? I am called. I am chosen. Oh this is just a short time for me......wait I will join you shortly." They would keep walking and ignore that simple fact that I was anointed of God for His purpose. Here I was - just a nobody, a horse in a corral that was going nowhere and quite plain.

But God.........................He saw things a little differently. My loss over the years of 2008 and 2009 was a loss of self-confidence and human effort to fulfill a supernatural purpose and destiny. My place of confinement was boring, simple, and so mundane. Each day I fought to get out and each day God kept me in that place of confinement. I mean, let's face it, I could have walked out. There was no keeping me there except my love to submit and obey. I could have also promoted myself and joined the 'mix' of people that seemed to be going somewhere but when push came to shove, despite all the pain and suffering to my flesh and my life, I stayed in the corral.

Why? Because I am a spiritual giant?? No. I simply knew that there were no shortcuts to a walk of wholehearted abandonment and surrender to God. To live in His increase and His, you must die to your life and lose it. So I stayed with one eye on the outside and one eye on God........I stayed and I waited. My focus was still divided but that would change over time.

For deep inside of me, I loved God with all that was in me. I had a seed of hope that I had to believe in - that He had not forgotten me and that there was coming a day where a breakthrough and a breakout would come.

But in the process, I had to learn to keep my eyes focused on Him and Him alone. Not easy but oh so so worth it.