Stop Struggling in Your Wilderness Season Now.

Estimated reading time: 15 minutes

Are you struggling in your wilderness season? Do you want to know how to stop struggling in your wilderness season? Maybe you want to get to where you are in alignment with God’s will for your life. This is for you if

• You know God is calling you into a season of refinement. Maybe you feel God leading you down a path of discomfort. And you might even have an idea of why He is doing that. Maybe it’s because He wants to take you to new levels or simply He wants to refine your character to reflect Him more, because that’s what you asked of Him. 
• You desire to follow God’s will. So God’s calling you to isolate so that He can reveal to you who He is to you. 

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There could be other reasons for the wilderness like, God pruning you to make room for the new. Either way, the wilderness could take on many forms. But one thing is clear, there is loss, separation, discomfort, limitation, pruning, and isolation. So if any of these words describe you, I want to encourage you to keep on reading. 

So first off let’s start by defining what the wilderness is. 

It is a period where a believer undergoes trials and difficulties and cannot experience the good things that life offers. If we reference it as a place, we can define it as an inhospitable region. When you are in the wilderness, you experience lack, limitation, and a lot of shedding off. Check out this post to learn more about the wilderness.

People who went through the wilderness.

Abraham’s wilderness season.

Abraham went through a season of limitation and discomfort. God asked him to move to a place he knew no one. God asked him to let go of the familiar and embrace the new. This was a wilderness period. He had to operate on faith and total reliance on God. He did not even know where he was going or what it would look like, but he still followed.

Maybe God is asking you to do something new. He could be asking you to step into something that you are not familiar with. It could be something as simple as starting a YouTube Chanel or something scary as leaving your city, country, and family and stepping out on your own.

Whatever the case may be, this is some form of wilderness. You could be experiencing limitations and also because it is new, you could lack the skills to navigate the new path that God has for you. Can you relate to this? Has God been asking you to do something that feels unfamiliar to you? Maybe it is time for you to go check out Abraham’s story and allow his testimony to ignite your faith. In the wilderness, you do not know the future and the focus is on day-by-day sustenance. Abraham, whilst going through his wilderness season, only had short-term goals because he did not have a place to fully settle and call home. The same goes for you. You could be experiencing a lot of instability. But today I want to encourage you to do what Abraham did, and that is, have blind faith. 

The Israelites

The Israelites. After leaving Egypt, God led the Israelites into the wilderness. While they were there, they had to rely on God for protection, sustenance, and provision. They did not know what their next day would look like. Can you identify with this? Are you in a season where you do not even know what your future looks like? Are you having to trust God because you don’t even know what your next move is? Maybe God is asking you to do something that has never been done before. This will require you to have blind faith in Him because you don’t even know what the future looks like.

The only thing the Israelites did was rely on God and depend on Him for everything. He fed them manna for the 40 years they were in the wilderness. Can you imagine their clothes did not even wear out? How cool is that? Anyway, back to the story. They had to trust God when they did not know what their future would look like. Along the way, we do not know how many things God protected them from. First off, it is a wilderness meant that there were wild animals. Yet God protected them the entire time.

Let’s not even overlook the fact that God protected them when the Egyptians came against them. Not only that, He parted the Red Sea. The Israelites did not have an army; it was God who fought for them. So their wilderness season encompassed a lack of warfare skills, too. Whatever wilderness season you are in, let this encourage you. It is when you are weak that God’s strength is revealed in you. 

David’s wilderness season.

David went through a wilderness season where he had to hide from his enemies. He was being chased by the king and he had to live in caves. Can you imagine that? And this was after God had anointed him as king THROUGH Samuel and he had killed Goliath. After that high season, he had to go through the wilderness for refinement and also for his skills to be sharpened. God wanted to prepare him and he did so unorthodoxly. So sometimes your wilderness season could look different, yet be prepared for your next season. Often we do not view the wilderness season as a period of preparation.

We are usually so busy focusing on what we have lost and the discomfort that we cannot see what God is doing in our lives. Here David was being prepared by God to take over as the king. And God had him hide out in caves and be a leader of the broken and ostracized people. Could it be that the season of hiding you are in is preparation for the position you have been praying for?

God knows what you need to get you to perfect the skills that will help launch your purpose. He knew David would thrive best in the midst of opposition. God knows what kind of wilderness He will take you through for your purpose to be revealed. 

Jesus

Immediately after John had baptized Jesus and God had validated Him, the Holy Spirit led Jesus to the wilderness to be tempted. Jesus fasted for 40 days and 40 nights before the enemy came in to tempt him. This should teach you that your wilderness season is when your identity will be put to the test. If you want to know what your purpose is, look at the area you are struggling with the most. The enemy because he has been around for a long time, has a way of discerning your purpose. Once he identifies it, he will test you in that same area.

The enemy tested Jesus on His identity because God had validated Him. Not only that, he knew that if he could get Jesus to question His identity, then He would not step into His calling. Has the wilderness season been so tough that you have forgotten what God said about you? Maybe you have been experiencing financial struggles and you are now doubting if God called you to be a kingdom financier.

Because of the rejection that Moses experienced when he tried to save an Israeli, he doubted God had called him to be a deliverer. He even went away to live in the wilderness and resigned himself as a shepherd. The wilderness season can lead you to define yourself based on it. But what you need to know is that it is just a season that will end. 

How then, can you stop struggling in your wilderness season?

Hold on to the words that God says about you.

Before you ever stepped into the wilderness, there were words that God spoke over you. You need to hold on to those words because they are your anchor. One of the cool things about God is that He will never take you through a test without first giving you the answer and marking scheme for the test. And the key is usually tied to what God says about you. So let me ask you this, what does God say about you? Maybe you had a prophetic word spoken over you right before everything went south. Can you recall what the word was?

Maybe God told you that you would be a great person, but now everyone seems to reject you and you are wondering how this will be. Or maybe God told you that you would be a mother, but you don’t even have any prospects in sight. Or worse still, the very relationship you thought would lead to marriage turned sour, and you guys broke up. Maybe God told you He is taking you to a new country, but you can’t seem to get the visa or, even worse, lack the finances to even process the said visa.

Do you see how the enemy works? The devil will only contradict God’s word. This is because he is a liar and the master opposer of God’s perfect will. Because God knows you and who He created you to be, He will give you all these promises to ensure that you hold on to them when the going gets tough. So hold on to those words that God spoke over you.

Abraham had to hold on to the promise God gave him he would have a son when things looked bleak. Let’s start off with the fact that he was well advanced in years and so was his wife Sarah. But he believed God’s word when it seemed hopeless. And then God came through and he had a son. Yes, it took a long time-25 years to be exact-but when the time was right, God’s promise to Abraham was fulfilled. 

Find testimonies of people who went through something similar.

Sometimes you will have to look for scriptures that talk about people who went through a wilderness season and how they came out. Reading the story of Abraham will help ignite your faith to believe that this is just a season and it will pass. There will be moments when the going gets tough. And you will have to strengthen yourself by reading stories of other people who went through the same. If you have been waiting on God for a spouse, reading the story of Ruth will help show you that God can do the impossible and He will connect people in unorthodox ways.

When you look at the story of Esther, you will see how God can change a situation and get you from being overlooked to being crowned queen. Looking at the story of Joseph, you will see how in a moment God is able to change your life and take you from the prison to the palace. Sometimes even searching for testimonies on YouTube will help you as well. Build up your faith as much as possible.

It is in your wilderness season that your faith muscle is exercised and built up. There is power in testimonies. This is how you will shut the enemy up when he tries to lie to you that your current situation is permanent. There are times and seasons in God’s kingdom. And if it is night now in your life, the sun will surely shine. Do not allow the enemy to bombard you with these lies. Encourage yourself with these testimonies. 

Ask God for Discernment in your wilderness season.

One of the best keys that will help you navigate the season of your wilderness is discernment. When you recognize you are in the wilderness and that it is just a season, you will have an easier time. This is a gift from the Holy Spirit. So you need to have a relationship with Him. He is more than willing to reveal to you all that is going on and the strategies you need to use in this season. Discernment is the awareness of your season. When you can discern a season, you can have faith to wait on God. and better yet, you will know how to navigate your current season.

Yield and have faith.

If you do not want to continue struggling in the wilderness, yield to the leading of the Holy Spirit. It is important to trust God and trust in His goodness. You need to get to where you recognize everything is working out for your good. God will never lead you to a wilderness unless He has something good on the other side. It was shortly after Jesus left the wilderness that God revealed Him to the crowd. Every wilderness leads to a launching season.

So, as you yield to God, you give Him room to do the work that He wants to do in you. Your current version cannot go with you to your next one because your next season will require another version of you. Therefore, the wilderness season is so important. It helps to refine you and prepare you for the next season. And since we know things don’t always stay the same, then allow God to do the work He wants to do in you.

Although you cannot avoid the wilderness, you don’t have to struggle in the wilderness. Yield just like Jesus did. The benefit of yielding is that you shorten the wilderness season. Because the Israelites were not willing to yield to God, they stayed in the wilderness for 40 years. This was an 11-day journey, yet it took them 40 years to get to their promised land. Can you imagine that? Not only that, an entire generation had to be wiped out except for Joshua and Caleb because of rebellion. Do not let this be you. Yield to what God is doing. And have faith in Him, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. 

Prayer

Communing with God through prayer and reading the word is very important as this will you stop struggling in the wilderness. You know prayer is not only communication with God, but it is also an avenue that opens our hearts to hear from God. As you pray, your focus is on God and this means THAT He has your undivided attention. In that, He can speak to you and give you all the keys that will help you stop struggling in the wilderness and yield to Him. Also, prayer helps to ignite your faith. This is because as you pray, you surrender to God and relinquish control, which shows that you are relying on Him. As you do so, you build your faith. The more you recognize His strength and sovereignty, the more your faith is edified

Reading the word

Reading the Bible gives you the confidence to trust God more. As you read His Word, you get a Revelation of who He is and His character. It is through His word that you see His heart and intentions for you. Throughout the word, we see the faithfulness of God.

Through His fulfillment of the promises He gave to Abraham, Joseph, David, Moses, Jacob, and Zechariah, you recognize that you too can trust Him to fulfill what He has spoken over your life. God is not a man He should lie to you. David even tells us that God’s word has been tried and tested and proven to be true. Seeing such scriptures will help to ignite your faith and give you the confidence to stop struggling in the wilderness. It will help you realize this season will pass and you will experience the fulfillment of the promises. Remember that God is good and goodness and faithfulness are who He is. 

Preparing for your next season.

When you are busy preparing for your purpose and next season, you will have less time to struggle in the wilderness. Sometimes idleness will get you to question the season you are in. So. Instead of just waiting on God passively, why not do the things that you can do to prepare for your next? If God has led you to the wilderness for healing and refreshment (Revelation 12) then focus on healing. Find podcasts, books, and YouTube videos that will help you with that.

If God is calling you to prepare for a specific role, why not prepare by spending time with Him and getting the strategies that you need to advance? You could get a journal and start writing all the things that He is asking you to do. Do something, don’t just sit there. There are so many things that you can do while in the wilderness. Instead of focusing on the limitation, focus on the things that you can do.

Maybe God is asking you to rest because He is ready to launch you into the busiest season of your life. While resting, why not develop your relationship with Him and learn how to fellowship with you? In the end, God is more focused on fellowship than He is on elevation. Not to say that He will not bless you. But He is more interested in you. So spend that time with Him. Soak up all you can and create the lifestyle that will help you in your next. 

• ARE YOU REALLY STARTING OVER?
• Are You out of the wilderness?
• REST IN THE WILDERNESS: CAN IT BE?
• When You Feel Like Your Best Days Are Behind You

Key takeaway on your wilderness season.

Struggling in the wilderness can be minimized when you focus on God. God tells you to focus on Him because when you do everything else will become strangely dim. If you have been struggling in the wilderness, I hope these keys help you find the rest and peace THAT God has for you in the wilderness. God promises to be there for you and even while you are going through the valley of the shadow of death, HE has not left you.

Also, it is important to remember that it is the valley of the shadow of death and not death. Don’t say stuck there. Use these keys to help you maximize this season. Because it is exactly that, a season.

Read this: Practical keys to navigate your wilderness season as a Christian millennial.

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Hebrews 12:2-3

Let me know in the comment section what key spoke to you the most and what ways you will apply the said keys. Looking forward to reading your responses. God bless you!