There's a difference between where you heal and where you reign

Last week I told you about the descent.

The Well of Initiation. The surgery. The pit pattern. Jacob's limp.

This week, I want to tell you what happened after.

God doesn't just rescue you from the low place. He moves you through seasons. Intentionally. Strategically.

I know for me, in my life, if I’m not paying attention, I might try to stay somewhere you were only meant to pass through.

After the surgery, Prudence and I stayed in a 200 year old AirBNB made from a converted windmill in Caparica, Portugal.

It overlooked the Tagus River. Quiet. Still. Beautiful.

I spent most of my time there horizontal. (Not by choice. My body was demanding it.)

There was a lot of sleeping. A lot of silence. A lot of just… being.

I'm a Driver. I don't do "being" well. I do doing. I do building. I do moving.

But the windmill wasn't a place for building. It was a place for recovering. And God made that painfully (literally, figuratively, and in every other way) clear.

The windmill was the womb. (I’m not trying to get weird here…)

It was where the extraction happened. Where the initial healing began. Where I had no choice but to rest.

Here's the thing…A windmill is not a throne room.

It's a place where invisible force becomes visible productivity. Wind comes in. Flour comes out.

Conversion happens.

You're not meant to live there. You're meant to pass through.

About a week into recovery, we moved to a new apartment in Lisbon. (We actually had to stay longer because I wasn’t even able to fly back)

When we walked in, Prudence looked at me and said, "This feels like a castle,"

She wasn't wrong.

I mean, it was an apartment IN an apartment building in the middle of the city BUT still… Giant ceilings. Echoey rooms. A wide stone staircase leading up to the main floor.

It felt ancient. Significant. Set apart.

Again for me, something shifted again.

In the windmill, I was healing.

In the castle, I was being prepared. (Still healing too though…)

There's a difference.

Healing is passive. You receive it. You let your body (and soul) do the work.

Preparation is active. You're being positioned. Equipped. Readied for what's next.

The wide staircase stood out to me. I had just descended nine levels in the Well of Initiation. Now I was climbing. Ascending. Moving upward.

The echoing rooms weren't emptiness. They were resonance. What you speak in a place like that carries. What you hear reverberates.

I started to sense that this wasn't just a nice Airbnb. This was symbolic. Prophetic, even.

God was saying something.

The Season Between Seasons

Here's what I think is easy to miss:

There's a season between the pit and the palace.

Joseph didn't go straight from the prison to Pharaoh's court. There was a process. A waiting. A preparation.

David didn't go straight from the cave to the throne. He spent years being shaped, tested, and positioned.

The windmill was my cave. The castle was my preparation chamber.

I KNOW some of you reading this are in the in-between right now.

You've come out of something hard. The pit. The surgery. The season of loss or confusion or pruning. You survived it. You're healing.

But you're not sure what's next.

You feel stuck between who you were and who you're becoming.

Let me tell you what I'm learning: that space is not wasted.

Psalm 23:1-3 says it this way:

"The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul."

Notice the order.

He makes you lie down. (For me that's the windmill.)

He leads you beside quiet waters. (That's the transition.)

He refreshes your soul. (That's the preparation.)

You don't skip steps. You walk through them.

One of the things God has been doing in me during this season is what I can only describe as a rewiring.

Not just healing my body. Reprogramming my mind.

I've spent most of my adult life wired for output. Momentum. Achievement. Proving.

And some of that is good. I'm a high-Driver. I build things. I move fast. That's how God made me.

But some of it is broken.

If I’m being totally honest with you, and I am… some of it is striving instead of trusting. Performing instead of resting. Running on fumes and calling it faithfulness.

God is rewiring those circuits.

He's installing something I've started calling "Prog Rest" — progress while at rest.

It sounds like an oxymoron. But I think it's actually the way the Kingdom works.

Isaiah 40:31 says, "But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

That's not a picture of striving. That's a picture of alignment.

When you're aligned with who God made you to be, and moving in the timing He's set, you don't burn out. You soar.

I'm not there yet. But I'm starting to see it.

One more thing I have to mention.

Prudence and I are bonding in ways we haven't in years. Maybe ever.

This trip forced us into each other. Not in a romantic Hallmark way. In a "we are surviving something together" way.

She navigated foreign roads alone. Sat in hospital waiting rooms. Managed everything while I was unconscious or useless. Held it together when I couldn't.

And I watched her do it.

I've always known she was strong. But watching her operate under that kind of pressure, in a country where she didn't speak the language, with zero margin for error? Folks she is a 50 point stabilizer…

It changed something in me.

We're not just married. We're allied.

We crossed something together. And you don't come out of that the same.

(If you're married, pay attention to this. Crisis either exposes the cracks or fuses the bond. What you do in the fire determines what you become after it.)

If you're in a season of recovery — let yourself recover.

Don't rush through the windmill. Don't try to turn your healing season into a productivity season. Let God do what He's doing.

But also — don't set up permanent residence there.

The windmill is not the destination. It's the conversion point.

There's a castle waiting. A preparation chamber. A place where you're positioned for what's next.

2 Corinthians 4:16-17 says, "Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."

Your troubles are achieving something. The hard season is producing something. The pit, the surgery, the windmill — none of it is wasted.

God doesn't confuse your recovery room with your throne room.

He knows exactly where you are. And He's already preparing where you're going.

Next week, I'm going to tell you about Óbidos — an ancient walled city where Prudence and I walked on the walls in the rain. (I MEAN RAIN)

Nearly alone. Quiet. Prophetic.

I'll tell you what I believe God is saying about the watchman's posture — and why He might be positioning you to see what others can't.

Until then — if you're in the in-between, don't despise it.

The transition is part of the process.

And the castle is closer than you think.

If you're trying to figure out who you are in this season — what you're wired for, what you're called to, what God actually designed you to do — my book Your Divine Blueprint might help.

It's about understanding your design at the deepest level. Not personality theory. Not self-help fluff. Real clarity about how God made you and why.

We're still giving copies away free this month. You just cover shipping. Prudence and I sign every one.

Get your free copy here → https://blueprint.goddesignedliving.com/free-book

Read more on the blog → https://chrisandprudence.com/blog/category/the-tenacious-pursuit-chris

Onward,

Chris Behnke

P.S. — The apartment in Lisbon had a washing machine that took three hours per load. Three. Hours. I don't know what that means prophetically, but I do know that sometimes the process just takes longer than you want it to. And you wait anyway. Because clean clothes matter. And so does patience.