Bill Johnson - The Discipline of Thankfulness
I want you to go to one of the most significant truths to really be embraced and taught on in the last 20 plus years has been the whole concept of impartation. But, what’s kind of humorous to, just forgive me for my sense of humor, again, but what’s kind of humorous to me is, oftentimes, people will come and ask for prayer for something that is actually a Mark of maturity. You can’t get maturity through impartation. If only that were true, man, we could just line up and be like Paul tomorrow, you know. Maturity comes from choices. Making decisions. So, you can pray for someone. You can be 1 minute old in Jesus and pray for somebody who has cancer and they can be healed. It didn’t come, the gifting didn’t come from maturity. Excuse me, the gifting, yeah, didn’t come from years in Christ: it just the maturity comes when you are now faced with decisions.
What are you going to do with the fact somebody just got healed through you? Do you think it’s your significance? Do you think you are the source of the gift? Do you think you are the source of the faith? How is the story shared? Is it shared with you at the center? Or Jesus? And all we do in those moments is, the Lord’s actually measuring what realm or measure of glory can we live with, can we carry. See, the original target of the Lord for every person was to actually live in the and just for simplicity’s sake, we’ll define the glory as the manifested presence of Jesus. It’s the actualized presence of God. And so, the scripture says all have fallen short of the glory of God. So, sin means to miss the mark.
So, sin causes people to miss God’s intended target. What was the intended target? The glory of God. To live in the manifested presence of Christ, not just as a point of theology, not just as a point of doctrine, «I’m in Christ, he’s in me», but more than that. An actualized, realized reality that we live from where we see the God of scripture appear in unusual ways and rest upon the manifestations in the temple or tabernacle. That is actually the manifestation that is potentially a part of everybody in this life who has a personal relationship with Jesus. So, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory. Missed the mark. What does salvation do? It restores us to the target. It doesn’t restore us halfway to the target so that in heaven we can get the rest. When Jesus said it was enough, he actually meant: I did everything needed to accomplish the original plan.
And so, Jesus lives among us, lives in us, rests upon us. But there are measures of presence that are yet to be discovered that have been discovered in prior and generations. His desire is to fully reveal himself, who he is, upon his people. Fully. But the weightiness of the Revelation would crush many people who are following the Lord. Because there are fractures in their thinking, fractures in their values. It’s not that they don’t genuinely love Jesus. It’s just that they have a weakness in their foundation that needs to be revealed gently and carefully so that the Lord can bring healing there. It is true. The Lord’s not afraid of bringing junk up in our life, bringing it to the surface. But he brings it to the surface so it can be dealt with. He never brings it to the surface to shame us or to mock us. He only brings it out so that we will see what he’s been seeing all along.
What confession is is we just make agreement with what he already knows to be true. And what happens, he brings it to the surface so that we can acknowledge it. Because once we deeply confess and repent, he gives us the grace to forsake that which kept us in bondage. All right, back to the subject. So the choices that we have throughout life are where the muscle of integrity, the muscle of character is developed. In lifting weights, for example, if you lift a light weight 100 times, it’s not gonna build muscle. It’s when you lift something that really pushes your capacity. And maybe you can only lift that thing three times. But it’s the third time that works the most. It’s the hardest lift. That’s what actually accomplish the most. And when we have difficult situations rise up in our life, it’s always for the purpose of building character. It’s never to shame, it’s never to mock, it’s never to intimidate or humiliate.
It’s always the invitation to come into Christ, into a place that’s when, in 1 Thessalonians 5, he says: rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, for this is God’s will in Christ Jesus concerning you. Think through this now: rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, for this is God’s will in Christ, concerning you. One of the most overwhelming, or, I shouldn’t one of the most frequently repeated prayers or requests from this family of believers, especially including our school, is this heart to know God’s will for our life. And, generally, what that is reduced to is: God, do you want me to be a missionary, or veterinarian, or schoolteacher, or pastor? Or whatever. We want to do what he wants us to do. It’s a legitimate prayer. It’s a legitimate request. I’m not sure God’s as concerned about that as he is about this.
This says rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, for this is God’s will. I could only have those three verses and it would take the rest of my life for me to learn it. I mean, if I had nothing else to read but those three verses, I’d have a full-time job ahead of me 'cause to rejoice always, to pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, it just means you have disciplined responses to levels of difficulty and challenges and opportunities that you have. You have disciplined responses that help to form and to shape the character in us. And, remember, it’s that character that is able to carry the weightiness of what God is doing in the earth. He’s looking for people he can trust himself to.
The whole impartation idea came as… I’ve been thinking it for years. I wish, if there’s one thing I could ask of the Lord to be able to impart to people it would be a thankful heart. You just don’t get it through impartation: you get it through do you know in Nehemiah, it’s kind of, to me, it’s an awkward part of a story. It’s in chapter 11, the end of chapter 11, and all of chapter 12. It has this reoccurring theme. There were people that were assigned to give thanks to God. «Oh, what do you do for a living»? «Oh, I give thanks. I give thanks». «Yeah? Like, what does that look like»? «Well, they just give me a list. And, I stand before God and I say thank you. And I mention what we’re thankful for».
That sounds so formal and so ritualistic that there’s no life in it. And yet, there’s a secret in that routine. You bypass the limitation of your own emotional condition and you make mature choices, which activates your emotional condition to get into line with what you’re doing. See, complaining empowers the inferior to undermine your faith. Complaining only happens when we are more mindful of a problem than we are of God. It’s impossible to complain when you’re more aware of the goodness of God than you are of a problem. To do that, you’d have to violate your conscience, your sense of purpose, your sense of being, the sense of God’s presence. You have to violate all of that just to start complaining.
Interestingly, Philippians I’ll just quote it to you, make reference to it. Philippians 4:6 talks about supplications and prayers. That’s the earnest, getting before the Lord, contending with God for a breakthrough. And he says «With thanksgiving». Why? Thanksgiving creates the context to keep prayer on focus. I mean, I know this is a dumb question 'cause all of us would say yes, but how many of you want to have effective prayers? Of course, we do. We wanna have, we don’t pray just to, you know, we’re not running on a treadmill, just trying to cover the miles. We want to bring impact. Our heart is to bring change, to see it our own lives, in our families, the world around us. We wanna see things take place because we’ve prayed. Thankfulness is what helps to keep prayers on target. There are times when praying for somebody, ministering let’s say they have certain problem. Arthritis, let’s just say, throughout their arm. And I’m praying for them. And nothing’s happening. Zero breakthrough.
And then, the Lord will give me an insight of a more precise way to pray. And when I change prayer from a general prayer of «God, heal the arthritis that’s in the arm,» and I get down to a very specific or precise prayer, then the breakthrough comes. I can’t tell you why, but I can tell you this: for me to stand up here and just say, «Oh, Jesus, please heal everyone in the room today, amen, we give you thanks,» nothing’s going to happen. Why? Because it’s gotta be more precise. And what thankfulness does is it hones the precision of our prayer life because it keeps it about him, because it’s that place of dependency, place of acknowledgement. The strength in prayer is not that you complain or bellyache about a problem. It’s that you joined your heart with his to see his kingdom and his purposes worked out in the earth. And thankfulness is what keeps see, it’s not a good sign to not feel pain. It’s not positive. It’s actually, it’s a sign of…
How many of you have ever made a prayer list out? How many of you, if you’ve not written one, you certainly have I mean, I’ve got 'em in my iPads, I’ve got lists in there of things that I pray for, and, you know, just stuff, stuff that I can contend for. I just get before the Lord: God, we’ve gotta see breakthrough, we’ve gotta see breakthrough there. And I believe in it. But how many of you have thankfulness lists? Probably not as many. There’s a few. And it’s wonderful. But the point is is we stay more conscious of need than conscious of blessing. And when I stay more conscious of need than I am conscious of blessing, I will tend to pray out of a hole instead of from heavenly places. I will tend to pray more out of a place, desperation’s not bad.
So, I don’t have the best language, so give me a little grace with this. But I will tend to pray out of a palace of desperation instead. Thankfulness, thankfulness hones that. Take a look at me with 1 Timothy 5, excuse me chapter 4. 1 Timothy 4:1. We’re gonna read five verses. «Now, the spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron, forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth».
Look at this again. Verses 1 and 2 gives us warning. I don’t know how your Bible reading goes. I just wanna encourage you: don’t skip over the hard stuff. It’s so vital. Here’s the difference: there’s meat and milk of the word. You with me on that analogy? There’s meat of the word. There’s the milk. Meat provokes change. Meat is called in Hebrews «The word of righteousness». If it doesn’t bring pain, it’s it’s not the word of righteousness that there’s gotta be that point where you go: it’s necessary. Let me illustrate it this way. There are people who have certain kinds of afflictions, difficulties in their body. And, perhaps, you go to a doctor and the doctor says, «Man, you have no feeling in your foot»? He says, «No».
So, he takes his sock and shoe off. And he takes a needle and he’ll just prick the bottom of the foot, and there’s no pain. See, it’s not a good sign to not feel pain. It’s not positive. It’s actually, it’s a sign of a problem is when something should hurt and it doesn’t. You don’t ever wanna read through this stuff and go, «Oh, yeah, all is well». Not a good sign. Not a good sign. You want that thing to prick. You wanna go: that hurt so good. But it’s that word that makes you know you’re so, he talks about those who fall away from the faith.
Interestingly, in verse 3, he says: «Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving». Let me just stop there. Paul’s attempting in the group that he leads, he’s warning them. He said: listen, we know people’s hearts are gonna grow cold, they’re gonna become deceived by demons. All this junk’s gonna happen. And, out of that group is going to come a list of rules, non-biblical rules. Now, remember, the Bible does give us commands. And don’t ignore them just because you live under grace. Grace doesn’t give you a pass to skip the rules: grace gives you the power to do the rules. So, here’s a list of rules that’s created out of this deceptive movement. And what is it? They are rules that make you more pleasing to God. That’s what they say.
So, in other words: you’re going to obtain favor if you do this. If you don’t marry, if you don’t eat certain foods, if you do this, this, and this. You observe this particular day. In Romans, he expands the list. He says you follow this day instead of this day, you eat this instead of this, you drink this instead of this list of rules, if you do everything just right, then you’ll have favor with God. The serpent crawled up to 'em and said, «If you partake of this fruit, you’ll be like God». They already were. The enemy tried to get them to obtain through works what they already had by grace which so, shifting the focus from what God has done for me that now enables me to live freely for him, the focus now shifts to what I must do to somehow apprehend and gain God’s favor. The focus shifts. And whenever that happens, it becomes a flesh-empowered movement. And that was the deception of this movement. Yes, amen.
In verse 4: «For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the Word of God and prayer». This is amazing. Here’s what he says: nothing is to be refused. What’s the point? What Paul had to deal with with a group of people is they would be invited to somebody else’s home and they would hear they were being served a food that was either unclean (pork or whatever) or it was actually food that was offered to an idol. And here he’s giving 'em instruction: don’t refuse anything that you would determine is unclean. Why? Because that which is used to be against you becomes sanctified by your own thankfulness. Your thankfulness takes the sting out of what the enemy attempted to destroy you. It is now used for your benefit because it is sanctified with prayer and the Word of God.
Sanctified. «Sanctified» is an interesting word because it means separate: separate from sin, separate from darkness, separated to God. But it doesn’t stop there. It actually implies that when I am made holy, as I am separated from my own lifestyle to the Lord, it implies I actually become like the one I am separated to. We should know this just in the natural. Husbands and wives who have been married a long time, they start thinking alike, they start acting alike. I mean, there’s just, this time of just being together. Or they change because they’ve been separated from everyone else unto this person and they actually, in many ways, pick up some of their characteristics and nature. Well, this is even more profound in a relationship with Christ because we are separated from a dark world system that is self-serving unto the Lord. We actually, in the relationship, become like the one we’re separated to.
Now, follow that thought. When you are offered something, in this case, it was food that would contaminate you, with thankfulness, it enables the Word of God in prayer to sanctify that that which was released against you. It now becomes something that is for you. Thankfulness takes the sting out of something sent I had a friend, acquaintance in dialogue with this last summer was writing a book. And it’s part of the book against me and against us. And so I wrote him and I told him I welcome the book. I welcome it. Not because I think it will add to the health of the body of Christ. But because what I want in life is on the other side of facing difficulty well. Navigating betrayal or criticism, you know, you can’t be trusted with praise if you don’t trust you can’t be trusted with a gain if you don’t trust him in loss. You can’t be trusted with loyal friends if you don’t trust him in betrayal.
And so, while I don’t think any of these things are designed of the Lord, I’m going to embrace them and learn how to navigate life through those challenging situations. Why? Because of the prayers I’ve prayed. I pray the same scary prayers you’ve prayed. Now, I wanna see everyone that we come into contact with healed. I wanna see everybody saved in our city. God, we wanna see nations discipled. These are huge prayers. But they are not released upon careless people. Because careless people become preoccupied with themselves in the midst of the glory being manifest, the glory being poured out.
And so, difficulties come our way. What is it? It’s just simply an opportunity to learn how to monitor my heart, to give thanks in all things, rejoice in all things, pray in every situation. Absolute dependency on him. Why? This is what we were born for. And what I want is on the other end of adverse winds. And I’ve gotta learn how to use my sail and the rudder, if you will, to attack until I can make the advancements necessary to get me to where I wanna go. So, I told him, I said, «I don’t welcome it 'cause I think it’ll help us, but I do welcome it».
You know, he wrote back very kindly and it ended up a long, long dialogue that isn’t the point of the discussion today, except that he openly, openly repented and changed that particular part of his book. And, it’s not necessary for today. But the point is being thankful for things, that you think the enemy sent your way, it doesn’t mean I’m thankful for the book: I am thankful for the opportunity to grow. I’m thankful that if I learn to navigate this right, he can trust me with more. I don’t like it. It’s not something I’d volunteer for. But I gave up my rights when I said yes. When I said the big yes, I gave up my right to bargain for what kind of circumstances I’m willing to face. And thankfulness is like: man, it’s, like, the number one virtue that changes a person’s life and, dare I say, the entire nature of a city. I think thankfulness can change the nature of a family line. Yeah. And, all right. Happy thanksgiving.