The Expiration of Isolation – Sarah Jakes Roberts

When God Breaks the Walls Around You

Family, welcome home. We’re grateful you’re here, because the message you’re about to receive carries the power to shift something deep within you. Whenever God speaks a word that pierces your heart—something you’ve been praying for, longing for, believing for—don’t ignore it. Honor what He awakens in you. Respond. Build an altar. Sow into what He is doing.

Today, we enter Exodus 12, where God prepares Israel for deliverance. After plague upon plague—water turned to blood, frogs, gnats, flies—Pharaoh’s heart only grew harder. Imagine crying out to God, hearing Him say, “I’m with you,” yet watching things get worse. Many of us know that feeling.

But then comes a different kind of plague—one that requires participation. God had acted for them before, but now He invites them to act with Him. Deliverance would not simply fall upon them; they had to step into it. They had to apply the blood, prepare the lamb, gather their households, and move in obedience while still in bondage. God was forming them for freedom even before freedom arrived.

He told them, “This month will be the beginning for you.” While they were still oppressed, God gave them a new calendar. Because He wasn’t looking at where they were—He was preparing who they would become.

And then came the sign:
“When I see the blood, I will pass over you. The plague will not destroy you.”

We know this world is full of plagues—fear, loneliness, disappointment, betrayal—yet God still places His covering over His people. The question is: Will we step into the form He’s calling us to?

Before we go deeper, I want to take inventory of the room. If you’re someone who easily asks for help—bless you. But for most of us, asking for help feels like climbing a mountain. Somewhere along the way, we learned to survive alone. Maybe no one came for us. Maybe the betrayal was too deep. Maybe we were misunderstood. So we built walls—not just around our lives, but around our hearts.

Some of us are isolated even while surrounded by people. Emotionally isolated. Spiritually isolated. Isolated in marriage. Isolated in friendships. Isolated at work. Isolation convinces us that no one can truly understand us. And after a while, even we don’t know how to enter our own hearts anymore.

Isolation often begins as protection—“I can’t survive another rejection,” “I can’t risk needing someone who won’t show up.” But slowly, what protected us becomes what imprisons us.

Think of David—isolated in Saul’s kingdom because he carried an anointing no one else understood.
Think of the woman at the well—isolated by shame and past mistakes.
Think of those seasons where God was silent to everyone else but met you in the midnight hours.

Some of us didn’t meet God in a crowd—we met Him in isolation. Not at the altar, but in the car. Not during worship, but in our tears. Not in the choir, but in the quiet space where no one else could access us.

And here’s the truth:
God knows how to invade isolation.

When we didn’t want to be touched, He touched us anyway.
When we didn’t know how to pray, He spoke anyway.
When we hid behind walls, He stepped right through them.

You came here today because God is speaking:
The isolation you used to need is expiring.
The version of you that survived alone cannot carry the freedom God is bringing.

He is preparing you to step out—formed, covered, whole—into the future He designed.