Have you ever been sleeping really good then somewhere between 2 and 6 a.m. God decides to answer your prayers with revelation and breakthrough? Well, although it wasn’t the first time it’s happened for me, about 3 weeks ago I received quite a wake up call from God. Part of me wanted to just turn over and fall back asleep, while the other part of me knew God was trying to speak to me. 

Let’s journey back to the night of shall we?

I was 2 weeks into internship here at Mainstream Leadership College (aka internship) and not used to the traditional 9-5 lifestyle so, let’s just say…my body was begging me for some rest. I remember hitting my pillow and knocking out at about 10:30 p.m. Which, I would like to add was making great timing considering the previous 2 weeks of falling asleep at midnight and beyond.

Anyway, the logical part of me knew what was happening, but I honestly just wanted it to be over with so I could get some sleep. At about 2 a.m. I found myself in a paralyzed slumber. Might I add, it wasn’t the scary kind so I felt fine. In the dream, I was laying down and opened my eyes and saw my room but, I couldn’t move. 

I began to desperately try and say the word “Jesus.” Attempt after attempt, my lips would not move and I was just stuck. Until I began to sing the lyrics from the lovely Tasha Cobbs Leonard’s, “Break Every Chain.”

I would like to add that in my head I sounded EXACTLY like Tasha Cobbs Leonard. After about the second run through of the chorus on the third “there is power in the name of Jesus…to break every chain, break every chain, break every chain,” I became conscious. 

Now at this time, I prayed, listened to some Tasha Cobbs Leonard and steadily became a little anxious. It was weird. Eventually I decided to turn on one of Steven Furtick’s sermons to have something to focus on in this time of disarray. The first one on my homepage on YouTube was “Trust Me I’m Trying!” so, I clicked on it…and ended up watching all 46 minutes and 18 seconds of it (putting my new time of bed at 4 am).

In his sermon he spoke on the PARALYZED man in the book of John, chapter 5 (which I had been studying and reading at the time) who had been waiting to get in the pool of Bethesda for thirty-eight years. This man had been waiting and trying to reach what had been right in front of him for thirty-eight years. 

And although it hasn’t been thirty-eight years of me trying to reach the promise God showed was right in front of me, I realized I had stopped trusting that God is Promise Keeper. I became impatient and fell complacent in my faith.

Psalm 119:82 “My eyes fail, looking for your promise; I say, “When will you comfort me?” 

This lead to the realization that whenever I tried to take a step towards that promise, I did so lacking the faith that He is Promise Keeper. That I could spend all this time “trying” and growing weary and questioning the one who never fails or I can just choose to trust. 

The man who had been paralyzed spent years waiting for someone to help him get where he wanted to be. But all it took was for him to trust the words Jesus and He was able to walk in his promise and desires.

John 5:8-9 : 

Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” 

9 At once the man was cured ; he picked up his mat and walked.” 

At that moment I felt this overwhelming sense of peace. God answered a prayer I’ve been praying for a while. It of course didn’t come in the way I expected (or time frame I wanted necessarily) but I was freed from the constant need to live on excuses and questions. But to have complete and utter faith that there is not a thing God does that is without purpose. I just had to trust.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhYA8aOFdT4 (sermon video!)

Shakira McGowan