Many Are Entering a Deep Work, Fallow Season Ordained for Breakthrough
Take courage because breakthrough is upon you.
A couple days ago, the Lord showed me so clearly that there are many who are about to step into their own unique place called Deep Work. And you see, it’s because He’s a good Father. He’s kind. He cares more about our wholeness and our ability to live from ever-increasing intimacy with Him than He could ever care about our activity (ministry or otherwise) or our ability to meet the expectations of others.
Abba is intentional. The reasons someone may enter this type of season are varied. For many, it’s a time of deep healing, deliverance and restoration. For others, it’s a call to invest deeply in the walls of their home and strengthen those connections for the years to come. For others, it’s a time of exchanging their well-laid plans for blueprints from heaven.
Abba is wise. He knows that in order to thrive as sons and daughters revealing the Father (Romans 8), we must BEHOLD Him. It’s only in beholding Jesus that can we understand His Kingdom rightly, come into alignment with His heart and partner with His purposes bearing fruit that remains.
I entered a season like this several years ago and it was unlike anything I’d ever experienced to that point.
This deep work time came in a season when I was very active in ministry in multiple areas and the Lord told me to lay it all down. Assignments He’d led me into, favor He had given, He was now asking me to put to rest. He said, “Hannah, you are to let the ground go fallow in this season. Let the ground rest. Trust me; I can do more in your rest than you can do in your work.”
For those unfamiliar with the idea of letting the ground go fallow, He was speaking to me about the sustainable practices of agriculture - rhythms modeled in the Bible (Leviticus 25:1-7) - that give Sabbath to the land itself so that essential minerals could be replenished, the health of the soil restored and protected, and ultimately that God’s people would look to Him - not their own striving - for the fruit of the ground and the yielding of harvest.
The parable of the sower describes our hearts as soil and His Word as seed. This “let the ground be fallow season” was a call to me to make space for the Holy Spirit to do a DEEP WORK in the soil of my heart in a way that a typical growing season would not allow.
As I surrendered my plans and laid down each assignment one by one, I assumed I might feel a sense of relief as though I was entering a vacation season. But It wasn’t quite like that. When my plate wasn’t full of activity, what felt like a tsunami of pain and unnamed emotions came calling for my attention.
It was disorienting at first. It took me a little bit to find my bearings but one day in prayer, the Lord gave me a picture that gave me so much courage. I saw a well and the Lord showed me it was my life and heart. He said, “You have a well and it’s been good, but I have so much more for you.” And I saw Jesus down on his hands and knees working inside this well, chipping away at the sides, pulling out junk and shoveling down to deepen it. He wasn’t daunted by the mud of my life that soiled His clothes. The look on His face was kind, patient and I could tell He knew what He was doing.
He said, “Hannah, if you hadn’t turned off the gush of this well to just a small essential flow, you wouldn’t have had the capacity for the deep work I’m doing within you. I know it’s messy. But I’m deepening and widening this well. I’m removing the junk and hindrances you didn’t know were there. I’m fortifying what needs to be strengthened and I promise I will not leave you this way. I will finish what I started. Just walk with me and as you come through this deep work, this well will flow with a force and purity that wasn’t possible before.”
And so I went through an usually intense and beautiful season of the deep work of the Holy Spirit. I’ll be the first to tell you I continue to be a work in process but friends, that season wrought a freedom in me I didn’t know was possible. Trauma was healed. Shackles of hidden religion and performance were broken. Shame was dispelled in His glorious light. My eyes were opened in new ways. To see Him rightly and see myself through His eyes. My husband felt it. My kids saw it. There’s not one part of my life that not been wildly affected by His work in me in that time.
Because God-ordained fallow ground is never wasted. It's a birthplace for miracles.
To those entering a DEEP WORK season.
I see a flood of people coming into a place called Deep Work. I see men and women, old and young, even children, encountering the Father in the cleft of the rock. (Exodus 33:21-23)
The Lord says, “Don’t misunderstand my intentions. Don’t confuse this place for demotion. This cleft of the rock is my goodness toward you. Don’t look to the right or to the left. Don’t compare your process with someone else’s. I’m exceedingly intentional about what I’m doing in you and I’m breaking the lie of abandonment, rejection and performance that makes this a scary place.”
I saw that many didn’t understand is that this undoing, this renovation of the heart, this radical renewing of the mind, is the answer to prayers many have prayed to break generational strongholds and be used by the Lord to see His will done on earth as it is in heaven.
The Lord says, “In this place, I am breathing upon the imaginations of my people to see my Kingdom rightly. I’m breaking off the frameworks of religion and raising a standard within them to arise as my pure and victorious Bride in the earth.”
Here’s some wisdom for your deep work season:
You may notice that grace seems to be lifting on certain assignments, the pace of your schedule or any number of things you may not have seen coming.
Get in the secret place with Father, root down in His word and ask Him for revelation, wisdom and discernment. He’s with you and He wants to help you navigate your inner and outer life by His grace/empowerment.
Don’t run from the deep reset God is wanting to do in your life. Trying to outrun a season of pruning, healing or heart renovation can have ripple effects on yourself and others.
Ask God to increase the fear of the Lord in your life. This will give you courage to stay true to His leading regardless of how supportive or understanding others may be about your process.
Stay in love. Forgive those who may have hurt you. Release those who are not willing or able to go with you. Bless those who have misunderstood you. Ask God to give you the wisdom and grace to relate to others in truth, love and honor.
Ask Holy Spirit to help you rearrange your life and priorities around what He’s breathing on in this season.
Your fallow ground season is holy ground. Lean in, my friend. He will bring you through.