Bill Johnson - Paying the Price for Revival
Welcome to God of Revival. This is the album that Bethel Music released not too long ago. We had planned to unveil this series, and then this pandemic hit, so we delayed a little bit because we felt we obviously needed to speak into that issue. I am really happy to talk to you about revival. My problem is I have a thousand things running through my brain that I want to say, and that could actually torture you, and I don’t want to do that, so I’ll try to keep it simple and focused. The heart of God is for—use any term you want: renewal, revival, awakening—all those things are similar. They are similar, but they are unique.
Revival, historically, has been a time where there’s an outpouring of the Holy Spirit; His presence and His works become very pronounced in a dominant way. Eventually, they dominate church life and, ultimately, culture itself. I personally believe that God has intended revival to never end. I know that studies of revival I have seen all declare that revivals are seasonal, meant to give a boost to the church for that particular season so they can go for a period of time without. The reason that conclusion has been made is that every revival has worked that way. In other words, we have come to the conclusion about God’s heart for revival by studying revivals, not studying God’s heart. God’s heart is that He moves from glory to glory; everything is progressive.
The scripture teaches that God lights the fire on the altar, but it is the priests that keep it burning. God lights the fire; He is the one. Revival is in His heart; the fire of God is meant to burn in the hearts of His people to impact the church and eventually impact society. That is God’s heart in every great move of God. However, oftentimes revival gets cut short for many reasons. Sometimes extraordinary things happen—miracles, supernatural encounters, and whatever—and the people of God start thinking it is a badge of honor for them. They start taking it as if they have brought this great move of God instead of giving Him all the glory. Anytime we take the glory to ourselves, we cut short everything He intended to do.
Sometimes it gets cut short because of the competition that takes place between churches and ministries. There are a lot of reasons, but I don’t want to go into those too much right now. I just want to say that I believe God’s heart is that a move of God would come into an individual, affect a church, impact a city, and ultimately impact a nation. God’s intention in every revival is to truly bring about a reformation where culture itself is changed. I would like to say that the ingredients for transformation are in every move of God.
For example, when Benny, the kids, and I first came to Redding, I went to Argentina because I had heard for so many years about the great move of God in that wonderful nation, and I wanted to see for myself. So, I joined Randy Clark, and we went down. Thank goodness, it was a 19-day-long trip. We spent time in Brazil and then went over to Argentina. I wanted to see what was happening there; I wanted to take a measurement, if you will, and see if it was similar to what was happening here. I had a lot of experiences, but I will boil it down to this: it was like a ripe red apple. What was happening in Redding was an apple that had just started to grow. It was not something you would want to eat; it was very tart, very bitter in taste, but it was growing. The point is, both are 100% apple.
Sometimes we abort moves of God because they aren’t what we read about in a book somewhere. We measure this against that and disqualify what God is doing. The Lord warns us about despising the day of small beginnings. Oftentimes we pray great prayers and appropriate prayers; we pray, let me use a metaphor, for the oak tree, while God gives us an acorn. There is an oak tree in the acorn, and there are millions of acorns in that oak tree. The point is that stewarding the moment God gives us is what takes us into the breakthroughs we’ve all read about and all long for. It starts very simply; it starts with that tug on your heart that happens in your home.
It’s not in a great meeting somewhere; there are not, uh, miracles happening right and left. There’s that response to the person of the Holy Spirit where we become drawn into this place where we want to give everything for Him to be glorified. Those moments are revival moments; those are moments that usher us into more extravagant breakthroughs. The heart of God is to change the nations of the world. The heart of God is twofold: it’s the salvation of souls but also to change the culture in which generations are raised so they would be raised in a culture that has a bent toward righteousness, that has a bent toward depending on God, seeking God, and calling out for His intervention.
That is what the Lord is working in you and in me—this increased awareness of His heart. Revival is basically the heart of God made manifest. It’s where we see more clearly, «Oh, this is what’s important to Him,» and we find ourselves, it was funny back in 1996-97, it was almost like you could tell which family was really in revival because their hair was messed up, their clothes hadn’t been washed in a while, and their lawn was growing because every moment we could, we wanted to be in the house to see what God was doing. I love that. I love that. But what is important to remember is that we have to know how to take that which God does in the corporate setting and learn how to translate it practically into society so that we live as revivalists in society.
Let me illustrate. Over the years, we’ve seen so many unusual but powerful encounters that people have had with the Lord. There are times when the presence of God becomes so manifest in an individual that sometimes they weren’t even seeking the Lord—they just happened to be in the room where God shows up. I saw this happen with Cal Pierce, one of our elders, many years ago. The Lord literally chose him, apprehended him, and changed his life in about a 45-minute encounter where he knew nothing but God; he was aware of nothing but God and his heart for Him.
Extraordinary! But these moments—the heart of an individual is so arrested, if you will, for divine purpose that he came out of that wanting nothing but to please God, nothing but to honor God, nothing but to celebrate God. What we’ve watched through the years is that these encounters change us on the inside. So let me just illustrate. Let’s say we have a woman who’s really struggling with life. The power of God comes upon her; she falls to the ground, which sometimes happens. God has a habit of doing things that are offensive to our minds, and she falls to the ground and trembles under the power of God for two hours. The problem is we tend to think that manifestation is what’s needed for revival.
Now, I’m not opposed to it; I celebrate it because I’ve seen enough of that over the years to know that God is doing an internal work through an external manifestation. The challenge is, let’s say she works at Costco. The goal for many people would be to get people to fall in Costco and shake for two hours on the ground. That’s not translating revival. Translating revival says, «I was so encountered by God that I have lost the fear of man. I have an element of courage in me that I’ve never had before.»
So now, where she works as a manager, she no longer cowers to inferior decisions; she’s able to stand strong and make bold decisions. That’s how you translate revival. You translate what happens in the house in a way that is beneficial to culture, beneficial to society. It’s vital that we protect what God is doing in the house; we don’t want to make the unusual experiences the message. The message is Jesus. But I will say this: most every revival introduces a new reason to be offended. Just read. It’s easy to look back and say, «Oh, John Wesley, what a great man! George Whitfield, what a great man!» You know, and to champion Smith Wigglesworth. But all of them were very opposed; in fact, they had people who were as famous as they were in the day they lived.
So, you know, in fact, I’ve got a name here. We know of Charles Finney. How many of you know of Charles Finney? Do you know the name John Nevin? Probably not, but he was the opponent of Charles Finney. We don’t know John Nevin today; you could find out about him, but his name isn’t promoted because history does not treat the critics of revival well. Tragically, in the moment of a great move of God, the critic is as popular as the revivalist.
I found a quote recently by a gentleman named Blaise Pascal. He was a French mathematician, inventor, and Catholic theologian, and he made a statement that has really become meaningful for me because I’ve seen this play out in life. He said, «There’s enough light for those who only desire to see and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition.» Let me read it again: «There’s enough light for those who only desire to see and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition.» I’ve watched through the years that the Lord manifests in a unique way, and for those who are hungry, those who want nothing but Him, they are not destroyed by the offense. The element of offense in the early 1900s was praying in tongues, and in the Catholic renewal, it was the fact that God was moving powerfully among Catholics, Episcopalians, and more traditional churches.
In the Jesus People movement, it was the long hair and bare feet; that whole element brought great offense to many people. In the Toronto outpouring, it was the laughter. God forbid we actually find ourselves to be happy, but that just brought great offense to so many people. Every move of God has some element that causes the mind to be offended. I believe it’s Paul Cain who said, «God will offend your mind to reveal your heart.» He will offend your mind to reveal your heart. It’s not as though the intellect is unimportant; it’s just that the mind will never lead you into revival. You will never get there intellectually. We all love the concept of the peace that passes understanding.
I was looking at that word this morning because I became fascinated—not for the message, but I became fascinated with this. It says, «The peace that surpasses understanding.» That word «surpasses» actually means it’s elevated. It’s almost like in a governmental role; it is so far superior. Peace is governmentally exalted and superior to all understanding. It’s superior; it is intellectualism from God’s perspective because it is a person. If you want the peace that passes understanding, you have to give up your right to understand, and it’s not a message against the mind, against understanding, or against wisdom. I believe in all those; some of my most favorite things are to understand stuff. But I know by experience, and I know as I read through history, the heart takes you where you need to go. It’s the surrender of the heart, the yieldedness to the work of the Holy Spirit, saying, «God, I don’t know what this is, but I am so hungry.»
I remember when I flew back to Toronto. We had had a wonderful visitation of the Lord in 1987 in Weaverville. It followed a trip that I made with a number of our leaders to Anaheim to the vineyard there, and John Wimber and his team, Blaine Cook and Brent Rue, and a bunch of others, had this conference on signs and wonders. I was so deeply impacted because they were equipping everybody to do it, and I knew I couldn’t be the stadium person to do that; it didn’t fit my gift mix or personality.
So, I was so hungry, and I saw how practical it was for that group of people; the teaching was the same, but their willingness to take risks was different. I came home, and miracles started right away. But I have to be honest with you; that visitation of God that was so extraordinary in 1987 would come and lift, would land and lift, would come and go over the next seven or eight years.
I remember flying back to Toronto, and I was praying because I heard there was a great move of God there. I remember praying on the way, saying, «God, if you’ll touch me again, I’ll never change the subject. I’ll never take what you’re doing and add it to what we’re doing. I will make what you’re doing the only thing we do.» That was my commitment then; that was my covenant with the Lord. Then I went to Toronto. I was there for—I don’t remember now, five or six days—and I didn’t have any unique experiences, but many great stories from people I know, people all around whose lives were so dramatically changed. Mine was too, but it wasn’t through some power encounter with God.
It was the fact that I was immersed in a presence in a glory realm of God that I knew helped define the rest of my life. I prayed and said, «God, I give You the rest of my life for this one thing.» The move of God is something that is unnatural not to hunger for; once you see it, everything of Christ in you rises and awakens to say, «That’s why I’m alive! I was born for this; this is what I was born for.» I remember that it started in my heart. I have been tender to the Lord my whole life. I remember receiving Christ as a child, and I was always tender to the Lord, but I didn’t have this passion for Him. I didn’t have this heart to seek Him and abandon everything, but there was a tenderness there.
I remember back in those days; I was probably 18 or 19 years old, and Chip Worthington, who used to be a youth pastor here, and Winky Pratt, who didn’t come here but whose teachings we heard, talked about revival. I didn’t know what revival was, but something awakened in me in my late teen years, and I could tell that this is why I’m alive. When I heard the preaching of Mario Murillo and the exhortation he brought to a generation to give everything for Jesus, I did. I threw my hat in the ring and said, «I give You everything.» From that moment on, I knew I was alive for revival. I am alive for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. I don’t want to settle for what so many people have settled for. I don’t want to think and say, «Well, let’s just learn to manage what we have.»
One of the scariest stories in the Bible is the story of the talents that were given out. Talents, of course, are sums of money, and one person was given five talents, another two, and another one. The scary part of the story is that the guy who was given the one talent didn’t use that money to make more. In other words, he took what he was given by God, in this metaphor, and protected it. I don’t want to be found living in a place of trying to protect a stationary position in life instead of moving on and seeing where what God has given me could take me. I want to use what He’s given me so that I step fully into what God says is possible in my lifetime. Yesterday, Benny and I were watching a documentary, which I don’t usually do; I probably should watch more documentaries, but I don’t. I tend to watch spy movies and stuff like that.
Anyway, we were watching this documentary, and I had my iPad, which I usually use to do two things at once. I’m not a good multitasker, but I fake it. We were watching this documentary on the migration of animals and insects, and there came a moment where I put the iPad down because something captured my heart, and I don’t understand it yet, but I feel it’s deeply prophetic. I can feel it in my soul. As I was watching, they began to show these monarch butterflies that are in this forest, I guess in Mexico. They are there by the millions; they migrate from Mexico to Canada, but it takes four generations to get to Canada—a multi-generational migration. Oh, goodness, about how lost I’ve become—a multi-generational migration. What it means is that the butterfly that hangs on that tree in Mexico, which begins the migration to Canada, starts flying, and then they lay eggs, and they have their, you know, what do you call it, the little worm in the cocoon in the butterfly.
I’m lost for words here. There’s another generation that takes on the journey, and they go as far as they can and pass it on to the next one. They die, and the next generation takes it until they get all the way to Canada—four generations to make that several-thousand-mile journey. Then, they’re there in Canada, I guess during the summer, and make the migration back to Mexico. For generations, a multi-generational migration, where we are going—not one generation can reach. This is so strong in my heart right now—not one generation can reach.
I must go as far as I can, enter into everything possible, and then pass it off so that the next generation can go as far as they can, knowing that they have another generation to pass it on to. Multigenerational—what God is doing on the earth right now is going to take a multi-generational migration into the things of God and the things of the kingdom unlike any time we’ve ever seen. It’s where every child grows up knowing they were born with divine purpose and that there is more—there is more—and it’s not an insult to my forefathers to discover more. I’m only able because I stand on the platform of their breakthrough; I stand on the platform of their success. This may sound a little strange to you, but my two favorite verses, at the top of the list anyway, on revival are actually from the book of Proverbs.
I want to read them to you real quick. The first one is Proverbs 14:4, and it says, «Where there are no oxen, the manger is clean, but much increase comes by the strength of the ox.» That’s revival. Where there’s no revival, the manger’s clean, but when you have a great move of God, get a shovel because it’s always messy. There is no such thing as a squeaky-clean revival; you only have that when you read it in history, and they cleaned up the text and removed all the offenses and problems. People have done that through the years. The Shantung Revival, a tremendous Baptist outpouring of the Holy Spirit in China, when they reprinted the story of that, they cleaned up all the messes, so it was squeaky clean to the point of being boring. If you want the real thing, go to Randy Clark’s website and get the story on the Shantung Revival because it’s extraordinary. God didn’t remove the offensive parts of people’s lives from the book—the difficult parts, the failures—but not just the failures; the things that actually caused problems for the people of God.
The second verse that I find so intriguing is from Proverbs 27, another passage I consider a revival chapter. It’s chapter 27, verse 7: «A satisfied soul loathes the honeycomb, but to a hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet.» To a person who is full, they become the restaurant critic and despise even the sweetness of the honeycomb, but a person who is truly hungry finds that every bitter thing becomes sweet. It’s extraordinary because I’ve watched this through the years, where people come into a move of God and begin to critique it as though they were restaurant critics, instead of coming because they were hungry. I’m not here to analyze the move of God; I’m here to be wrecked by the move of God. I’m here to be rearranged by the move of God.
What happened in Wales in the early 1900s—oh my goodness, what a story! It’s one of my favorite parts of all of human history, what happened in that era with Evan Roberts and a bunch of young people. The outpouring of the Spirit became so strong that some of the major great godly men and women from England came into Wales—not to analyze; I don’t want to critique them—they came in to see what God was doing. This is their own testimony: it was such a holy movement that they felt they needed to leave to let the young people run with it. In other words, they would contaminate it with their expertise. Wow, what wisdom! What wisdom to realize sometimes we need to just back off.
Sometimes we need to back off. Jesus gave a warning about this; He said, «Don’t try to pick the tares out from among the wheat, lest you destroy the wheat.» Think about that. When God moves, we often, especially as leaders, want to protect the people from errors—which we should; that’s part of our job. We want to protect them from this extreme, this exaggeration, and while we always have our defenses up to ensure that we protect the people, Jesus also gives a warning. He says, «Here’s the thing about wheat and tares: they look the same.» The only time you can tell a difference is when it’s time to harvest because the weight of the grains of wheat on the stem causes it to bow, while the tares stand up straight.
So Jesus warns: «Don’t over-concern yourself with the tares, trying to pick out the wrong things because you’ll pick out the wheat, you’ll pick out the right things.» This is a warning concerning, I believe, moves of God. Be careful that you don’t become so controlling of your environment that you don’t give room for God to step outside of what you approve of. Many people reject the move of God because they see God touch somebody else in a way He’s never touched them. In other words, I become the standard; my experience becomes the standard for how God can touch you. One of the great mistakes is judging what’s happening in a room by my own experience, which is an arrogant posture to take because it comes with the notion that I’ve experienced everything first, and then He’ll touch you according to how He’s touched me.
It’s just not the way it works. It comes to people who are poor in spirit, who are hungry like children, who simply want more of God. They’re not asking for everything to be explained; they come simply asking for a Father to show up and do what only He can do. Of course, there are souls saved; of course, there are miracles in people’s bodies and deliverances. I’ve seen it in this room where the power of God comes upon a person.
I remember when the outpouring first started; just an unbeliever would come into the room, and the power of God would literally capture them. Capture them. They didn’t know what was happening to them, but they would lay there and weep and weep and weep, turning their hearts toward the Lord, not knowing what was going on but understanding that God had chosen them. I think sometimes we get accustomed to a gospel that we fully understand, which means a gospel that we can control. It’s about control.
People say, «Well, this wouldn’t happen when the Holy Spirit moves, because He teaches self-control.» Self-control is a manifestation of the Holy Spirit’s control. First, you must have the Holy Spirit’s control before you learn self-control; it’s giving yourself to the great and mighty work of God. I want to read to you from the book of Joel. I’m torn because there are so many places to go here, but let me at least do this. I want to read from Joel, specifically chapter 2, and then we’re going to jump to Acts. All right?
So if you have your Bible before you, which I hope you do, get those two places ready. I was going to go to Acts 19 because it’s outrageous and wonderful, but I just don’t think I have time for it. So let’s just do this today: we’ll go to Joel 2, and then we’re going to go to Acts 2. I want to show you something. Let’s start in Joel 2, verse 23: «Be glad then, you children of Zion! Rejoice in the Lord your God, for He has given you the former rain faithfully.» I think the New American Standard says, «the former rain in vindication,» which is interesting—that the Lord would vindicate us with His outpouring, vindicating us in our own personal wrong decisions in life. The areas where the enemy has stolen from us, the outpouring comes to fully vindicate us, displaying His faithfulness. He will cause the rain to come down for you, the former rain and the latter rain.
Rain in the scripture represents the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, which we see a little later in this chapter. So when you see rivers of water, pools of water, or rivers in the desert, having rain—those are all symbols of the work of the Holy Spirit and manifestations of His presence. Jesus validates this in John chapter 7, where He refers to the Holy Spirit as a river. But look at this again: «He will cause the rain to come down for you, the former rain and the latter rain.» So the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the book of Acts and in the days that we live in—the latter days, the last days—started in Acts chapter 2. So if those were the last days, these are really the last days. Then He goes into verse 28: «It will come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh. Your sons and daughters will prophesy.»
So it’s both male and female. «Your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.» So the age barrier is broken. «And also on My menservants and maidservants I will pour out My Spirit.» So the class barrier is broken. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit creates a level playing field for men, women, young, old, rich, and poor. All of those boundaries are destroyed in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. In Acts chapter 2, after Joel 2 was fulfilled, you see an interesting response from people. If you’ve got your Bibles, look at Acts 2. It says in verse 6, «This would be fun to study more at a later date,» but right now just look at verse 6. «When this sound occurred,"—this sound is not just a crowd of people praying in tongues. It is a heavenly roar that has broken into the city of Jerusalem; the entire city is hearing the open heaven over that city—it’s a roar of God.
Everybody in the city hears it; they all drop their tools, their toys, or whatever they’re doing, and thousands begin to flock to this group of believers who are praying in tongues, praying in languages they don’t understand. It says in verse 6, «When this sound occurred, the multitude came together,» and they were confused because everyone heard them speak in their own language. Then they were amazed, and they marveled. It says in verse 11, «We hear them speaking in our own tongues the wonderful works of God.» So what was confusing still had divine purpose. Verse 12: «They were all amazed; they were perplexed.» And verse 13: «Others were mocking.» So here you have it—this is a good revival right here. They were amazed, they marveled, they were confused, they were perplexed, and there was mocking. That’s how you have a move of God; you’re not going to have a move of God without those elements present.
There’s always opposition to the move, and if you’re one who is bound by the fear of man, get the heart of God over the issue. Don’t succumb to guilt and shame; let Him touch you deeply. Cry out for more in the secret place; in the private place, we cry out for God. In public, we take risks; we look for problems, we seek places to serve, and in quiet time alone with God, we cry out for more. However, in public, we look for opportunities for Him to be displayed. When I went to Toronto, I’ve already explained that I didn’t have a dramatic experience, at least not the first time, as so many around me did. So many friends, so many people that I now know had their lives changed. It wasn’t that; it was the fact that the Lord gave me a seed. He gave me a seed; He provided the acorn instead of the oak tree I prayed for.
It would have been easy to dismiss that and say, «This is not revival.» But I knew that in that seed there was enough of God to radically change the rest of my life. I knew it. I was given a treasure from heaven, the pearl of great price. I knew it had been given to me, and it was small, nothing extravagant enough for me to walk around and show people. It wasn’t that; I knew that He had given me what I had asked for. It was in seed form, but I had to cultivate it, and that began a season of day and night crying out for more— that God would cause this seed to grow, that He’d cause this, which He entrusted to me, to flourish. Others may reject it, but God, would You cause this to grow and impact our city, our church, my life, and our nation?
I prayed day and night. I would wake up in the middle of the night praying; in other words, I was praying in my sleep, and I would actually wake myself up because my spirit man was so alive, contending for all that God had promised. I found myself unable to sleep; I’d just wake up and find myself praying. I don’t have time for the full story here, but that lasted for eight to nine months, and then the Lord met me. I ran faithfully with the seed, but He met me at 3:00 in the morning, and everything changed. Everything changed. I think if you were to ask my friends from Weaverville, they would all tell you that I didn’t struggle with the fear of man, as I made courageous decisions and was willing to go against the grain.
It wasn’t a problem. But the Lord knew that there was still a seed of the fear of man in my heart, and He showed up in a way with such extreme power at 3:00 in the morning that lasted all night. I had no control; it was the raw power of God, and I knew that He wanted to know if I meant it when I said, «God, I want more of You at any cost; any cost I’ll pay, any price.» He began to parade scenes in front of my eyes of me trying to communicate to the church, realizing there was nobody who would believe that what I was experiencing was actually God. In the next scene, I stood in front of my favorite restaurant in town, realizing that not only would I be the laughingstock of the church, but I would also be mocked in our community. It felt like the Lord was asking me, «Did you mean it when you said more at any cost?»
I lay there with tears running down into my pillowcase, and after about 20 minutes of seeing scenes of what it would cost me, I said, «Yes, You can do anything You want with me if I get You in the exchange, the increase, the manifestation of Your presence. If I get that in the exchange, You can do anything You want with me.» I believe God is going to use this very strange season, this pandemic. Now we have such prime opportunities to be alone with God; we don’t have the excuse of busy schedules or too many responsibilities.
We have who we are face to face with who He is, and He wants to take you and me. He’s positioning us for an extreme, mighty outpouring of the Spirit—something that will actually affect the course of history for nations. It’s been happening for a while, but I tell you what, it’s on the edge right now and is about to break loose in a way we’ve never seen before. Having said all that, I know there are many of you as believers who just need to confess to the Lord, «God, I’m all in. Do whatever You want with me.»
And there are some I know that are watching. You’ve never given your life to Jesus, and this is probably the most awkward opportunity for me to ever say, «Come to Jesus! Give your life to Him; be forgiven, brought into the family. Know what it is to walk as a child of God and truly give yourself so that He would be glorified.» But I’m going to ask you to do it right now. Just pray a simple prayer with me:
Father, I come to You as a sinner. I come to You as a sinner. I need forgiveness. Please forgive me for all my sin. I turn to Jesus. I declare Jesus Christ is the Son of God, my Lord, my Master. I give myself completely for His glory. Amen. God, I give You everything I am to discover everything You are. Amen. Amen.