By Jaci Pellham

In May, the Lord shared a prophetic word with me. He didn’t tell me who it was for or when I was meant to release it, so I let it sit in the notes of my phone and didn’t think about it again.

On New Year’s Day, God reminded me of the word, fleshed it out, and hit me with deeper revelation. I felt led to share this word with our Legacy Ladies community.

In college, we are bombarded with temptation. This is encouragement for those times when you feel like you’re losing to whatever you’re struggling with.

“The water is calm and cool and dark. It mutes everything going on above the surface. A couple is entwined in the depths, kissing passion into each other. One is exhilarated; the other is greedy.

The greedy one begins to shift, to morph, and reveal itself. With sick realization, its victim starts to struggle and writhe, increasingly more desperate to escape. All efforts are futile in the iron grip, and the pair sinks like stones to the very bottom of the lake. It wasn’t enough, was the last thing thought as unconsciousness and darkness digs its claws in.

The evil thing radiates pride in its conquest, but the victory is short-lived. Some One dives in to reclaim His loved one. In moments, He has His daughter back on the shores. He gently breathes life back into her lungs.

When she sees Him, she expects a reprimand, a disappointed sigh, or maybe a condemning word. What she sees instead? A smile. A big, relieved, tender smile.”

Her strength wasn’t enough to get away from what entangled her. His strength was. Don’t try to wrestle with temptation on your own! We will experience shortcomings, but (praise God) our success and fruitfulness doesn’t depend on our own ability.

The Lord is with you to protect you, to guide you, to love you, to comfort you. He is so present.

Lean into Him. In my struggle with lust, leaning into Him meant keeping in contact with Him. I don’t know about you, but my knee-jerk reaction is to act like I’m not thinking impure thoughts. If I don’t acknowledge it, it’s not there, right? The first step was looking at my temptation head-on and talking about it with God, even when I wasn’t ready to repent. Avoidance and apathy are our two biggest obstacles to accepting God’s help in our lives!

Remember that He loves you. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:38-39).