This word is submitted by Musa Opiyo (mopiyo@btinternet.com)

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            The Seed And The Fulfillment Of The Promise

The Lord is releasing the fulfillment of the promises He has made to His 
children in this day. Many of these promises have occurred almost as 
instantly as they have been spoken. Yet for many of God's people, you 
have waited long and hard and have wondered whether God really did mean 
what He said. Some have even doubted that it was God who spoke at all.

But the Lord says that many of these promises are likened unto a baby in 
the womb. Once that word was spoken and imparted, it was put in the belly 
to grow and mature. To the natural eyes it may have seemed that there was 
no outward manifestation. In fact, if anything, circumstances went from 
bad to worse. Supports and comforts that were once available are no longer 
there to sustain, and as the child of God gropes for support, they realize 
that there is One who has been their rock and their fortress the whole 
time, the Risen Christ, Jesus Himself.

As they learn to trust in the Lord, their faith begins to rise and grow. 
Without faith it is impossible to please God. Faith causes God to act. 
As the faith is activated through the word and through victory after 
victory won, that seed of the promise planted deep within begins to grow 
and form.  As God brings more tests and trials, sometimes ones harder 
than the previous, God reminds His people of who He is. He reminds His 
beloved of the inability of their strength and the supernatural power of 
His. As this promise grows after a period of molding, testing and the 
furnace, the time of birthing arrives.

Pushing, that last final advance before the promise, is always the 
hardest. But God promises never to leave us nor forsake us. That child 
pushes past oppositions, forgetting those things that are behind and 
reaching forward toward the prize of the high calling of God. Forget 
the voices of unbelief and circumstances that do not line up with their 
vision, and push forward. Like a bull in the ring that focuses on red, 
so the child of God focuses on the red crimson stream that flows from 
the cross to the throne of God.

He never said that it would be easy. But it is in the journey that He 
has formed Himself within you. He could not have done it any other way. 
There are some aspects about the journey to the fulfilled promise that 
God chooses not to reveal because if He did, we would refuse to move 
forward and cause that growth to be stunted through words of unbelief 
on our part.

Be encouraged. The Lord has not brought you from one hellhole to let 
you rot in another. The only thing at this point that rots away as 
we behold Him is our flesh which grows more corrupt everyday, but we 
arise in the new man who is built according to the design of God. If 
the road is narrow, you are on the right road. When you find mountains 
on your path that are insurmountable, that is God's opportunity of 
showing Himself as the Almighty. When you find the words of mockery, 
rejection and slander come forth, rejoice for Jesus suffered the very 
same things.

Your wilderness time is over. It is a new day for the fulfillment of 
your promise. It is the day when the Lord is bringing many out of the 
caves into the battlefields. It is a day when He is bringing many out 
of the pits into the palaces. Do not give up now. God is getting ready 
to birth something new in the lives of those who simply say yes to Him. 
It is the season and it is the time of transition from one place to 
another.  Shut the doors of the past and go through the new doors He 
is forming for you.

Step in and do not look back. Keep your hand to the plough and activate 
those gifts and talents that God has placed in you. Some are saying, "I 
have no gifts and callings." Pray and ask God to stir those gifts within 
you for the glory of His kingdom.

"To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under 
heaven." - (Eccl 3:1).

"For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy 
to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us... Nay in 
all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us." 
- (Rom 8:18,37).

"Nay but O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing 
formed say to him that formed it, 'Why hast thou made me thus?' Hath not 
the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto 
honor, and another unto dishonor?" - (Rom 9:20-21).