After a woman came into our church and declared to everyone that she had a dream that I would cast out a demon, I soon found myself doing just that. I worked with a person for the next two months, pushing through every confusing roadblock we came across until we finally had a big victory to celebrate. In that moment, the Holy Spirit then spoke to them some kind and simple words. Thinking we were close to done with the deliverance process, I tagged some more amazing words on top of what God had to say.
The next morning I woke up with the strangest phrase in my head: “Mutation of words choked out by Disney.” I quickly realized that the Holy Spirit was talking to me and that I was the cause of the mutation. I had tried to amplify God’s kind and simple words into a fairy tale ending where everything was great and everyone lived happily ever after. Little did I know at the time that we had just scratched the tip of the iceberg and that there was way more ahead of us.
But no matter what we faced, we still had the original prophetic word to hang onto. God had sent a person to our church to declare that this battle was coming and he most certainly planned on winning that battle when he prophesied it. So we leaned into that word for many months to come, recognizing that Jesus could bring about victory no matter what we faced.
Paul found himself in a similar situation. He was given a prophetic word that he would go to Rome, but was then stuck in jail for at least two years. And when he finally got on a boat headed to Rome, their ship hit sailing problem after sailing problem after sailing problem until they were eventually shipwrecked. But Paul had a prophetic word to lean into and he did so until it finally came to fruition. Indeed, the reason Paul pulled through all of the sailing problems he faced was because God continually provided for him in the midst of the storm.
*This devotional was created out of the themes of Acts 27:1-8 found in today’s reading at CommonPrayer.net.
Jamin Bradley 