The journey of faith isn’t a sprint — it’s a long walk with the Lord. In this episode, Nina Pajonas shares how God builds spiritual stamina in us through pruning, plateaus, and moments when we feel weak. Discover why true strength isn’t about pushing harder in your own willpower but learning to rely on Christ’s love, the source of endurance that carries us further than we could ever go alone. If you’re weary on the path, this message will remind you: His love is the strength that sustains you.

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Remember, the Lord can turn your wounds into wings—you were Born to be a Butterfly! 🦋

Born to be a Butterfly © 2025 Nina Pajonas All rights reserved. The content of this podcast is for informational and inspirational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice. For the full disclaimer, visit ⁠ninapajonas.com.

When I first got sober,

I let myself go.

I ate every piece of candy I wanted to eat, and you couldn't tell me otherwise.

Anytime somebody said,

why are you eating all of that candy?

I'd reply,

it's either a Hershey's dark chocolate with almonds or a bottle of wine.

Take your pick.

And while that was sarcastic of me to say,

what I really wanted to say was,

I'm doing the best I can.

Stop judging me.

But now that I've walked with the Lord for some time,

I would say it like,

don't judge the way I carry my cross.

I'm bearing the weight of this burden the best way I know how.

And the truth is,

our best gets better the longer we walk with the Lord.

Back then,

candy felt like survival.

But it wasn't about sugar.

It was about soothing my soul because I was learning to live without alcohol.

Today,

comfort looks different to me.

Comfort looks like prayer.

It looks like worship.

Comfort looks like resting in God's presence rather than reaching for something sweet.

However,

that shift didn't happen overnight. It occurred over the course of several years.

Slowly but surely, the Lord showed me that he had to be the One that I turned to in all things.

Welcome to Born to Be a Butterfly, where we embrace healing and growth in Christ so that we can experience true transformation.

My name is Nina Pajonas, and I pray that today's episode ministers to you.

In my mind, eating candy wasn't as destructive as drinking.

But over the years I have come to find out that seeking comfort from anything other than Christ is a dangerous place to be.

I say that because on my journey with the Lord, I've realized that the longer you walk with him,

the more he will take away.

I have learned that the Lord takes away things that weigh you down because they make it harder for you to walk further with Him.

The goal is to walk further, right?

The further we walk with him, the more we get to know him, the closer we get to him, and the more we are transformed by Him.

It's not about looking the part or playing a part.

It's not a role.

It's a way of life.

It is your identity in Christ.

It is not a mask that we put on to look more like our Messiah.

It is not a temporary state of being.

Transformation is the temporal seeking the eternal,

eternal life with our infinite God.

Sometimes on our walk we can hit a plateau,

just like in fitness when you've been doing the same thing over and over again,

your body adapts and progress stops.

Spiritually,

it can be the Same way.

When that happens, it can make you feel distant from from God.

So I have a few suggestions for you if that's the case.

Sometimes the answer to your spiritual struggle is simple.

You might not be doing what you once did.

Or it might mean that the Lord is calling you to do something different.

Change the rhythm.

Pray in a new way.

Open Scripture at a new time.

Sing when you usually stay silent.

For me, it looked like this.

I was praying similar prayers every night,

but it felt like I was going through the motions.

It felt like I was talking to God but not connecting with Him.

Then one night,

I felt the nudge of the Holy Spirit.

I sensed that he wanted me to sing,

so I did.

But it wasn't a song from the radio.

No.

Instead,

it was a song that seemed to bubble up from my soul.

At one point,

I wasn't even singing words.

I was only singing sounds.

I'll refer to Romans 8, 15, 26.

As Scripture says,

in the same way the Spirit helps us in our weakness,

we do not know what we ought to pray for. But the Spirit Himself intercedes for us through wordless groans.

As I sang,

I began to cry because I felt his nearness in a way that I hadn't in weeks.

If you feel spiritually dry, you need to drink more living water.

But don't settle for comfort.

Don't count on what you used to do.

Predictability can easily become complacency.

You must seek Jesus continuously in all things until His Spirit flows fresh again.

After that experience,

I continued to implement other changes in my life.

In fact, a few months ago, I started walking every morning.

And to be perfectly honest,

the Lord led me to that as well.

When I first started,

I couldn't go far and I couldn't walk very fast at all.

But now I walk roughly three miles or more every day.

Each week, I try to push myself to do a little bit more,

to walk a little bit further.

I've come to realize that I enjoy setting new goals for myself,

that I like to challenge myself, to push beyond my comfort zone.

But the funny thing is,

I didn't know that about myself.

I thought I knew myself, but I didn't.

The Lord has stripped away the layers of who the world told me I was,

who I thought I was supposed to be,

and what I thought I was supposed to do.

The longer I've walked with him,

he has stripped away all of those things,

and he has revealed who he has truly created me to be.

We are changed when we allow the Holy Spirit to move as it wants to and to remove what it needs to.

It's incredible to discover what we are capable of when we walk fully in the identity that God has given us.

I'll refer to Philippians 4:13 New King James Version I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

I think sometimes we just like to focus on I can do all things.

However,

we must remember that we can only do all things because Christ strengthens us.

He gives us the fortitude our Lord and Savior gives us longevity and spiritual stamina.

Which brings me to this A couple of weeks ago, I was walking when I felt the Holy Spirit prompting me to sing out loud.

Now let me say this.

I don't usually sing while I'm walking around my neighborhood, but I definitely felt led by the Spirit to do so.

Then the song I Know a Name by Brandon Lake and Cece Winans came up in my soul.

So I started to sing it loudly as I continued to walk.

And during those moments I felt the Lord was telling me something unusual.

It felt like he was telling me to establish dominion over that territory.

And at first I questioned it. I thought to myself, who am I to do that?

But then I remembered it isn't about me. It's about the authority that I carry in Christ.

So I sang the song confidently because my Lord and Savior told me to.

It actually reminded me of Jericho in the book of Joshua,

when God's people marched around the city walls and shouted as he commanded them to.

And you can find that in Joshua 6, verses 1 through 20.

They didn't bring the walls down with their own power.

Their voices and their obedience to God's word did.

And the same God who gave them victory then is the same God who gives us authority today.

Sometimes breaking through a spiritual plateau looks like that.

Obedience to a strange instruction that doesn't make sense in the natural but has power in the spiritual.

All of these things transpired during my season of sorrow.

For weeks I kept praying,

lord,

please give me strength.

I kept quoting Paul's words from 2 Corinthians 12:9 10.

But he said to me,

my grace is sufficient for you,

for my power is made perfect in weakness.

Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me.

That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.

For when I am weak,

then I am strong.

And then a revelation came to me one day.

The strength that the Lord came gives us is his love.

Love is what lifts burdens When God strengthens us,

he's not just handing us extra willpower.

He's enlarging our hearts.

He's giving us a bigger capacity to love.

True strength isn't willpower.

It's love.

The kind of love that forgives,

lifts, and carries you.

For years I'd thought that strength meant toughness,

that it meant grit or putting on a stoic face.

I thought it meant pressing harder, hiding my tears and pushing through.

But God showed me something better.

True strength is softness. It's being able to forgive when bitterness feels easier.

It's staying tender when the world makes you want to harden.

It's loving someone who hurts you instead of carrying hate.

That is why loving the Lord and prioritizing him above everything and everyone else is so important.

The Lord's love allows you to love others better because everything you pour out flows from what he has already poured into you.

And just when I thought I understood his love as strength,

the Lord gave me a sign that I'll never forget.

One night, I prayed for strength once again.

But I went on to ask the Lord to give me a sign that he had heard me.

The very next morning,

during my walk,

I saw something that I will never forget.

Seemingly out of nowhere, an eagle came flying and landed right in the middle of the street in front of me.

And it stopped me in my tracks.

I'll refer to Isaiah 40, verse 31 NIV 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.

And what's even more amazing about that whole experience is that I forgot about the sign that I had asked God. For in that moment, I was just marveling at the majestic bird that was in the middle of the street that afterwards ascended and flew away with ease and grace.

It wasn't until I began walking again that it truly hit me.

My Lord and Savior sent an eagle to exemplify the strength that he was sending me.

He had it show up to give me the sign that I had asked for.

I believe with all my heart that when we seek the Lord in all things and we ask him for signs,

he will show us things that will blow our minds.

If we want to see more of the Lord, we need to look for Him.

And when we do,

he reveals Himself in ways that leave us awestruck.

Maybe for you it won't be an eagle,

but it might be.

I have no idea and neither do you.

Maybe it'll be a scripture,

something that The Lord keeps putting in front of your face time and time again because he wants to send you a message.

Or maybe you'll have a conversation with someone and they will answer a question that you asked the Lord.

Or maybe it'll be a song on the radio that touches your heart and moves you in a way that you feel the Holy Spirit comforting you during a time of trial and tribulation.

I don't know how he will choose to speak to you.

I don't know what signs he's going to send your way.

But I do believe that if you ask him for a sign that he will show up in ways that will stop you in your tracks too.

I won't sugarcoat this for you because I would be doing you a disservice if I did.

The longer you walk with the Lord,

the heavier your cross will feel.

But you're never supposed to carry it alone.

I'm going to refer to Isaiah 40,

verse 11 NIV he tends his flock like a shepherd.

He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart.

He gently leads those that have young.

That's our reality.

At times our shepherd strengthens us to walk,

and at other times he carries us.

The Lord has carried me many times on my journey.

Sometimes it's been for a day or two,

while at other times it has been for a season.

In my darkest moments,

Christ has both covered and carried me simultaneously.

The length of time may vary,

however,

what never varies is the victory that he carries me to.

So don't fear the plateau.

Don't worry when you get weary and don't resist the new things that he calls you to do.

Because in every single one of those moments he is strengthening you not with human muscle or might,

but with his divine love.

And today I'm just going to ask you one question.

What lesser comforts have you leaned on in place of Christ,

and how is he calling you to release them?

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father,

thank you for being our strength when we get weak.

Please carry us when we're struggling and fill us with more of your love so that we can love others well.

In the mighty and miraculous name of Jesus,

we pray.

Amen.

If today's message spoke to you, please share it with a friend and follow Born to be a butterfly so you never miss an episode.

If you're ready to dive deeper into my story of healing and transformation,

you can get my book From Broken to Butterfly on Amazon.

If you have any questions or would like to connect,

Send me a DM on Instagram @born to be a Butterfly, or you can email me at ninapajonas@gmail.com. You can find the link in my episode description.

Remember,

The Lord can turn your wounds into wings.

You were born to be a butterfly.