Bill Johnson - Healing Our Land
Oh, I feel like I just went to heaven and back. Didn’t want to come back. Maybe we didn’t. Yeah, we’re still there. That’s right. Oh goodness, wow! Okay, amen. I think—I’m not sure; I didn’t hear clearly—but it was probably pretty good. Um, there’s someone here who struggles with fibromyalgia, and Jesus is going to heal tonight. Who is that? Who struggles with that issue? Right over here? Okay. Oh, we’ve got three together! Whenever there’s a specific problem, and they’re sitting close to each other, that’s an unusual coincidence, which is the language of the Spirit. It shows that He’s breathing on something, and it always encourages me because, you know, it’s not a support group, but there are three right together with that problem.
So Jesus is going to deliver. In fact, we just saw this last week in Charlotte— or a week and a half ago; I’ve been gone forever, it seems like. Um, not in Charlotte, but in Bradford, England. They’re close to each other; there’s a little pond called the Atlantic Ocean that separates the two. Yeah, yeah! All right, so geography wasn’t my strong point. Um, in Bradford, there was a woman who I believe had been in a wheelchair for ten years with fibromyalgia and ME. She was up—completely healed, completely set free! So I believe the Lord is doing that again tonight. Um, who here has ever broken your jaw, and you have ongoing problems because of that? Who is that? Put your hand up high. I don’t want to miss. Right back here? All right! Jesus is doing a good healing work there as well. There are inflamed, swollen gums and possible gum disease involved that I believe Jesus is healing tonight, right there.
Okay, um, there’s someone here who, uh, I think had a break in the right ankle that just didn’t heal correctly. And so you’ve got weakness and pain in that right ankle. Who is that? We’ve seen two together; that’s awesome. It’s a broken ankle club right back here! Yeah, and I love that! All right, and if you’re not with those two, you can still get healed; you still have prayers! All right, all right! Um, yeah, the Lord’s healing that. There’s actually some—I can feel it—there’s like tendon or ligament damage. I don’t know the difference, so forgive me—but it’s right here on the top of the foot; there are some issues there with that pain. Is that you? Yeah? Stand up; check it out— it should be all right! Check it out right now. Yeah, just move it around. Yeah, this is moving around real good! Check it out. Yeah, tell me how it’s doing. Is it good? All right. Did you check it out? Is it good? Is it good? Yeah? Yeah, good! Come on! All right, beautiful! Yeah, that’s so cool! Thank you, Lord! Ah, do you have any brain? Yeah, just grab a mic here. We got Mike somewhere. Oh, they’re up here with me! All right, any of you guys that have any words of knowledge?
Yeah, while the Lord was speaking to him, I was hearing, um—like, I don’t know how to describe it; I’ll do the best I can—like your hip is, um, I don’t want to say deformed, like misaligned, like maybe the socket where the leg comes into the socket—there are two different sizes. Yeah, does that make sense to anybody? Yes? Is that you back there? Yeah? All right, all right, good! So I just—I can see the Lord completely reforming your hip. It’s beautiful! Beautiful! Can you feel? I mean, does it affect you right now, or what? Okay, we have one here, and then one way in the back there as well. Okay, what’s up?
Yeah, when you were trying to mostly? Nice! Oh yeah, man, just sleep well tonight! Well, you could sleep while I talk tonight; we could check it out at the end of the message to see how you do! Many have fallen asleep when I’ve talked! Um, and just along the right side, it’s like a cracked femur. All right, still cry? See somebody nodding their head; does that make sense? Just wave your hand if that’s you. Um, we want to—I hear voices; maybe it’s—I have issues—oh, there’s overflow as well! Okay, yes, anyone in overflow, just make sure you get in on this! Yeah! All right, so anybody else got here? Okay, yep, go ahead.
I believe God wants to heal pleurisy, so it’s like water in the lung, and hand in hand with that, just reoccurring bronchitis to the degree that you actually, from reoccurring coughing, you’ve cracked your ribs. Does that make sense to anyone? Put your hand up if that’s you; we want to make sure you get healed. Maybe we can have somebody run interference for me in the overflow. Um, just, Joel, why don’t you go over and check any of those three things? So reoccurring bronchitis, pleurisy, which is like a lining on the lung of water or extra fluid that’s impacting your breathing. All right, and then any persistent coughing that has caused any ribs to crack? All right, for reoccurring for six months! All right, all right! Tonight’s the night it ends! All right! All right! Yep, yep! All right, beautiful!
All right, there are a number of folks that have issues with their voice, their vocal cords. Um, I don’t know if it’s nodules; don’t know what it is, but there are a number of folks with issues there. Sound like it got healed! Okay, so all right, so the condition you call—that was in there, was in the overflow? All right, good, good! All right, so the vocal cord, the voice issue, put your hand up quick! All right, wow, that’s a whole bunch! All right, we just had somebody—uh, their tongue was healed; they weren’t able to taste food, which is absolutely the worst thing ever! And, uh, so the Lord’s going to restore taste. We just had that healed in London, I think it was, uh, no ability to taste, and the Lord just healed and restored that. So, who’s that has, uh, there’s an issue with—right here? Okay, all right!
So whoever prays for her, make sure you have a mint or something ready! Uh, I’m serious because we want to check it out right away! There’s also or chocolate; chocolate would be better! Um, yeah, mints will do; mints will do! Yeah! All right! Uh, there are also digestive issues, food allergies. Uh, there are a lot of things we can pray for, but there are certain things that just stand out to me right now. So if you have any kind of food allergy—oh my goodness gracious! All right! So you notice tongue taste, food allergy—we’re going after the big things right now, the important things! I believe the Lord is going to heal! In fact, there’s somebody who has digestive issues, and it has caused other diseases, other problems in your organs. I don’t know what it is, but it’s—the one digestive issue has caused a domino effect; does that make sense to you? Because I just heard that as we were talking about several. All right, all right!
There’s also hearing loss; anyone with hearing loss put your hand up, we’ll go for that! Okay! Anybody here with cancer? We always—right here? Right here? Okay, anyone else? All right, cancer fingers, fingers and toes! Okay, so there’s somebody who has an issue under the tongue—put your hand up real quick—right there! All right, and there’s a problem—is it broke? Broken? Uh, you’ve broken fingers; you have issues with your hand, with your fingers? If that’s you, put a hand up quickly! All right! We’ve had many times where the Lord literally has reset bones in just a moment of time! In fact, we had a guy right back here that was run over by a 14-ton truck, crushed his ankle years ago, and so it was put back together, but there was pain, very restricted movement. Somebody prayed for him; his ankle turned cool, and then popped, and it was completely healed! So strange, saying wonderful—wonderfully so! All right, so fingers and also toes. Did you say, Brian? The toes, same thing? All right! So who, the frequent broken toes, or issues with the toes? Put your hands up; might as well get in on this! All right! Everyone who raised your hand over any of these things, stand! Beautiful! Not beautiful—you have the problem! Beautiful! You’re about to get rid of the problem!
All right, here’s what I need you to do: those of you that are sitting down, you are now the prayer team! And, uh, so I need, um, all of you that are standing, put a hand up; I want you to keep it up until someone comes to you! As soon as somebody comes to you, put your hand down! So those of you that are seated, find someone! Husbands and wives, you don’t have to pray for each other; I want you to have fresh meat; you’ve already prayed for each other! All right, but don’t start yet! Shh! We still have hands up! Okay, we’ve got somebody—we’ve got two right down here in front of me! We have a third one right back here! We have one right over here to my left! The Lord gave some of you two hands for a reason, so that you could take on two people! He’s the one who does the healing anyway, so it’s not—you! All right! I think if we missed you, wave a hand at me, and I’ll make sure to get somebody to—!
All right, here’s what I need you to do: you’ve got to find out what the problem is! Those of you that are receiving healing prayer, keep it simple; they don’t need a description of the accident; they just need a target! All right? Those of you doing the praying, lay your hands on them, and just pray your best prayer, but speak to the problem, command it! God, let me pray over you! All right, so Holy Spirit, we do welcome You! I ask that You come and glorify the name Jesus through miracles, through signs, through wonders! Ears open now in Jesus' name; we command ears to open! Digestive systems, be restored to God’s perfect design in Jesus' name! The obstruction of voice right now, we just pray that healing oil of Jesus—the oil of Jesus—to flow down that throat, fully restore everything that’s been compromised in the name of the Lord Jesus! We speak to the bones: broken bones, be reset now! The trauma to that jaw, this trauma involved in that breaking of the jaw, I just rebuke trauma right now in Jesus' name! Release you from that, and declare the healing word of Jesus—the healing word of Jesus! And we speak to the hip joint: be fully recreated now in the name of the Lord! Fully restored now in Jesus' mighty name! Okay, we’ve got about 30 more seconds! Thank You, Lord!
Okay, go ahead and end your prayer, but stay with the person; don’t leave them! End your prayer, go and say amen, but stay with the person! Shh! Okay, just give me your attention; you can stop your prayer now, please, have them stop! Thank you! You can pray past the miracle! I’m sorry; you can pray past the miracle! Back up! All right! All of you—all of you that received prayer right now, just try to do something you couldn’t do! Um, if it was a muscle tendon issue, move around; if it was digestive—I don’t know—eat something, I guess! I don’t know! Come on! All right! In some way, try to do what you couldn’t do! If you had a growth, a tumor, try to feel it! If there’s hearing loss, have somebody whisper! In some way, examine yourself! Everyone who’s at least 80 percent better, would you wave both hands over your head like this right now? Just wave both hands over your head! Yeah! We bless You, Lord! We thank You! Thank You, Lord! All right! Turn and pray one more time! Turn and pray again! If they’re 100 percent, you don’t have to pray because you might mess them up, but other than that, I want you to pray one more time, and just bless them! Just release that presence, that power of God—restore fully in Jesus' mighty name! Okay, got about 30 seconds! Thank You, Lord!
Okay, go ahead and end your prayer if you would. Now I’m going to ask everyone to stand. Just look up this direction here if you would; we’ll be through with this in just a moment. Now it wouldn’t hurt for everyone to say this, but especially those who just received prayer. The reason we pray for the sick is we want Jesus to get what He paid for! When we experience something, if we experience suffering, He takes it personally. Do you remember when He appeared before Saul when he was persecuting the church, and He said, «Why do you persecute me?» He takes it personally! When you’re blessed, He takes it personally; He is blessed in your blessing! So I want everybody in the room that was prayed for, especially. I want you just to say this after me: «I received the healing that Jesus bought for me!» Now let’s make that confession together: «I received the healing that Jesus bought for me!» That was good; still is! All right, check yourself out! Check yourself out; it requires movement! It requires you to do something now! Interesting! All right! Everyone who’s at least 80 percent better—I want you to wave your hands over your head like this! Just take a look around your church! Somebody give thanks—bless You, Lord! Wonderful! Okay, go ahead and be seated! Go, NBC! We’re going to open the word here in just a moment! I would love to hear—I would love to hear what Jesus did! How come you were so excited back over here? What happened to you?
Okay, well just wait a second—let’s get a microphone over here! Yeah, help me out; just go over there! Yeah, I’m going to make you do the running; I love when other people have to do the work! What happened?
I don’t know how I hurt my hip, but I’m a runner, and it’s been aggravating and bothering me when I’m running! It wakes me up in pain in the night! When I sit, and then I go to stand up, it was just— it was locked up and painful, and I just have complete freedom! I can’t move—it’s not beautiful! Thank you!
I would love to hear from maybe two other people, uh, just to give testimony. Everything that Jesus does is significant, but if you had the Lord do something pretty extraordinary in your body, I want you to let us know—right back over here we have one! Yeah, just come out to the aisle; hang onto the mic. That mic’s a million dollars right there; just hang it out! Yes?
So when you were talking about the hand and fingers, I broke my hand, and it affects me whenever I play the keys and stuff, and I actually had calcification on my hands from the break, and it’s completely—wow!
So one other person that would be willing to share is just—you know, going right here’s good!
One—my healing was for loss of hearing! You know, I’m 72, and um, it’s done! Like, and I was happy after I knew it happened, and I clapped my hands, and it hurt!
It’s awesome! Thank you! All right, that’s beautiful! Everyone that got healed tonight, just stand up! I want to see who you are! Look around the room! Isn’t that beautiful? Thank you, Lord! That’s awesome! Just where’s the mic? And just get—give the story, and then we’ll move on!
Yeah, good! Brian, explain what happened here! The Lord is still healing somebody; I’m sorry, with that right hip; there’s still somebody who has an issue in the joint—not in the hip area specifically, the joint! Who’s that? Yeah? If that’s you, stand! Just stand up, put your hand on it! Yeah, right here too! Anyone, just stand up and just stand there with your hand on it because I’m declaring to you, Jesus heals and restores! There’s also someone who has an injury to the Achilles tendon on the right leg that Achilles tendon has been damaged; it’s torn, or maybe it was injured years ago, never fully restored! All right, you’re well; just pretend I’m dyslexic!
There’s also somebody who has an injury—my goodness, this is now spreading—it’s, uh, there’s pain—a fair amount of pain in the tissue on the left knee, right under the kneecap! Right in this area here! Is that you? All right, you have stitches there? That’s why it’s tender? Okay! All right!
So the right one got healed; now you’re going for the left. That works! All right, all right! Now just give testimony! And you guys just stand there with your hand on the problem and let’s just go for it!
Yeah, so I went and prayed and laid hands on the gentleman with the, uh, with the misaligned hip socket, and then this guy who’s sitting next to a couple chairs down from him said, «Yeah, I’m the one with the cracked femur!» And, um, and he’s got a steel plate in his leg, and I asked him how that works out, you know, and he said one leg’s longer than the other, and it makes his hip really sore! And so we just came over here and said, «How is it now?» I don’t really have pain, so I can’t test it, but my right leg was like a half inch longer, yeah, so I put my hips up against the wall to check that, and he said my legs are even! So I couldn’t see a difference; he couldn’t see a difference, so it’s been that way for like 15 years! Man, come on! That’s awesome! That’s beautiful! Thank you, Lord!
All right, all of you standing, check yourself right now! Just check yourself out! All of you standing, just check yourself! Do something! Just do something! Yeah! All right! Is there any improvement for anyone who’s standing? Just wave your hand at me if there is! Way in the back over here! Right down here! Right over here! All right! Anybody else? Right here, yep! Right here’s another! Another! All right! Thank you! Another one right here! All right! Who’s that? Who’s that? Achilles—who’s that? Achilles on the right—on the right leg? Yeah? Is that you over here? How is it? It’s the same? Somebody lay hands on it because I want it to stop bothering me! I could feel it actually! All right, all right! Yeah, just all of you just lay hands on whoever you’re standing close to, and just pray for that miracle to be completed there! And then we’re gonna move on!
Yeah, just declare! We just release the presence, the power of the Lord Jesus over these bodies! We declare Jesus as the one who restores all! Thank you! He makes all things new! So just confess that with me once again: «I received the healing that Jesus bought for me!» Let’s say it all together: «I received the healing that Jesus bought for me!» Amen! Amen! And go ahead and be seated! I just returned this week, late Thursday night, from—I was actually gone 16 days, which I don’t—I don’t go that long anymore! I used to, but, uh, I don’t like to be gone that long! But I went to Charlotte to be with Mahashin Bonnie Shabdo, wonderful friends of ours, and then went to London and did the Hillsong gathering there in London! A little tiny home group of about 20,000 people—you know, that would be a Reinhardt Bonnke home group! You know, so, um, and we just had—I had such a wonderful time, and I’m so impressed with Hillsong! So impressed with the integrity of the people, the strength of the ministry, their focus, their priority, and they are really in this season amping up their, uh, their risk and appetite for miracles and breakthrough!
Oh goodness! It’s hard to say how many because you—you can’t manage a meeting of 20,000 people in direct traffic at all! You just give words of knowledge, we pray! Uh, but someone told me— they asked me at least there’s a thousand or so people healed just in maybe a 10-minute slot, literally a 10-minute slot, and pretty some pretty extraordinary things took place, including metal in the back and all kinds of stuff that was completely—all healed and went from there to Bradford, England! Bradford, England! And was there in a leadership gathering about 1,400 people! And the last night we had this this gal in a wheelchair. She’s up and, uh, besides herself with joy because of, uh, being, uh, so afflicted for so many years, and it was just completely gone! We had a guy there that broke his arm, had a metal plate in his arm from kickboxing, and the metal plate, if you were at the civic here two—I think it was two years ago when Randy Clark prayed for this, uh, this was it a gal? It was a gal—we had a metal that stuck out about an inch or so from her bone, and this—this is the same thing with this guy.
They prayed and prayed for him, and nothing happened, and finally, they felt they needed to ask him to forgive himself. When he forgave himself, it just dissolved! Just this—this thing is sticking out this far, just literally, just—well, Michael, my assistant, is a medical doctor from Australia! And, uh, so he’s over there checking; he says, «I can’t find any metal anywhere!» And there’s this gal that got hit with this virus that caused her to go blind enough to where she couldn’t read, and, uh, she had been to the doctor the previous week, and there would be no further improvement at all! She could, I guess, see shape and color or light, but not, uh, couldn’t read anything at all! And they prayed for her; her eyes—she was reading the fine print on Michael’s phone!
So there’s a gal there with a hunched-over, a large lump on her back, uh, hunched with the, uh, kind of crutches that hook up to you that you—you struggle to walk with, and that big lump in her back completely disappeared! She’s standing upright, got rid of the crutches, and walking! So it’s just—it was just something! So, uh, so thrilled to see what’s happening in Europe! Come on, Jesus! You’re—how many of you are from Europe? Man, this is Europe’s time! I’m telling you! It is what’s going on there we dreamt about years ago! And it’s—it’s happening, actually, right now! It’s unfolding! And, uh, so very encouraged!
All right! Uh, we’ve already gone for a while, but I still have a while to go, so if you get through before I do, just go home! Um, here’s—I’m really torn, because I started sensing some things during worship, but I—um, let’s, uh—let’s go to the book of Jonah. When in doubt, go to Jonah! Now Jonah is what I talked about at the cascade this morning! I want to do that again! I’m going to try to abbreviate this; I want to respect the time, but I also want to, uh, I want to hit a subject here pretty hard if I can in, uh, and shorter than normal—don’t be encouraged; that’s relative!
I want to read a passage to you out of Second Chronicles 7:14. It is, at least in my estimation, the most famous verse on prayer, on intercession, and on healing of the nation: «If my people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land.» Let me read it to you again: «If my people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin, and heal their land.»
I’ve never seen a time in my lifetime when there was a greater need for the healing of a nation, the healing of cities, and the healing of the land. That verse has never been more in our face, and it’s important that we don’t become—it’s all right; nobody can see you! So if it happens, just strangle that thing! Just—good evening, nice to see you!
There are certain words from the Lord that are so inconvenient that they are easy to ignore or to bypass. They’re so demanding that they are easy to downplay or relegate to a specific group of people other than ourselves: «If my people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray, turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, I’ll forgive their sin, and I’ll heal their land.» Please notice it didn’t say, «If the sinners would stop sinning, I’ll heal the land. If those in authority that are making ungodly decisions that are infecting the mindsets of the people—if they would repent, then I’ll heal the land.» He didn’t say that. He said, «Of my people, if my people—those who are called by my name.»
The interesting thing about this particular mandate—we see it a number of times in Scripture. Nehemiah, for example. Nehemiah was the cupbearer to the King; he was a most trusted individual, a man of great excellence and integrity. He would taste the King’s food. I mean, if people want to kill you and you have somebody tasting the food ahead of you, it’s got to be somebody you trust. Yeah, and so Nehemiah was that man, and one day he came before the King, and he was downcast. Now you have to understand in that particular era, kings controlled the environment around them. If anyone had a depressed look, they could be killed—at minimum, removed from position—because they wanted nothing of that sort in their presence. Everything about their life was pleasure, gratification, longevity, was the blessing of their family and family line.
So when Nehemiah comes in one day and he’s downcast, the King says, «What’s the matter?» And he knows it’s a critical moment and he just mentions the people of God were in bad shape. Jerusalem was torn down, destroyed. And then he prays, and he prays this prayer: Nehemiah does, and he asks the Lord to forgive—pretend like we’re Nehemiah—"God, forgive us, for we have sinned.» Here’s the interesting thing: Nehemiah was a righteous man, but he prayed as though the sins of the people were his sins. I hear a lot of people in ministry; they talk about them and those and you all, and there’s this stuff that comes out like it’s your problem, not our problem. And what happens in the humility of prayer is it doesn’t mean that that particular sin is my sin, but I so deeply identify in compassion with the people I’m praying for that I stand among them in prayer and I say, «God, forgive us for our sins, for we have sinned against You!»
Intercessory prayer means basically to stand in the shoes of another and plead their case as though it was your case. We need that right now! If my people—for my people—don’t wait for somebody else! If my people who are called by my name would humble themselves and pray, seek My face, turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven! I’ll forgive their sin and heal their land! Time doesn’t permit to expand much on this healing of the land, but it means the earth itself! It’s not just the spiritual atmosphere, obviously—that’s there—but if you—if you search the Scripture, you’ll find that creation itself groans and travails waiting for the day when the people of God would actually find out who they are, come into that place of purity and strength and power, and that would be a healing of the land!
We find in Scripture where creation often echoes the work of the Spirit of God among His people; it mirrors—in Psalms 87, or no, 67, it talks about the people of God coming into a place of blessing, and the earth then responds and yields its produce. If you’ve ever seen any of the videos—they’re probably on YouTube by now—the videos from Al Malanga, Guatemala, a city that was a horrible agricultural region, couldn’t grow anything—deeply steeped in sin; alcoholism was rampant. It was great poverty—horrible, horrible statistics for that part of the world. And a revival hit, and they turned in repentance to the Lord; they cried out to God for forgiveness. He so healed them as a people that alcoholism just all but disappeared. Poverty was broken, and their land is now so healed—literally, the earth is changed! It is so healed that they will have multiple crops a year! I’ve seen the videos and the pictures! Character like this—there are universities, agricultural centers will send students down to study what happened! The point is, it’s healing of the land!
We need the land healed! It’s not about pleasing Him; it’s not about getting wealthy! That’s always included in blessing! But if that’s the focus, it always turns around to bite us! It’s the fact that we become productive! It’s the fact that all of creation begins to cooperate in the purposes of God to fulfill the reason why we are on the planet! We are on the planet to thrive; we are on the planet to represent Jesus well! We are on the planet to glorify Him and spread His love to as many people as we possibly can in our lifetime! It’s—if you’re a musician, you are designed by God to represent Him in the sound that you release into the earth! If you’re a business leader, you were created by God to do things in business that would actually increase and improve the welfare of the community that you live in! Business—godly business—is not, «I prosper; everybody else suffers.» It’s that my ideas help everyone to prosper, and I prosper in the meantime! It’s—it’s the healthy approach to life! It’s not just this that we just make do until Jesus returns! He’s actually designed life to work! And Paul described it as reigning in life! In Romans 5, verse, well, somewhere in there, verse 17, I think, reigning in life!
So all of that out of this one verse about prayer: If my people! Don’t wait for the politician to repent! If my people! Don’t wait for the educator to change! If my people! Don’t wait for the celebrity to change their mantra, their verbiage, their stuff that they speak! Don’t wait for them to change! If my people would humble themselves! And pray! Authentically! All right, go—are you in Jonah? Did you get tired and quit? Jonah is just a great story, and I–I don’t know about you; I love the Old Testament so much! One of these days, I’m going to have the courage to do a series just out of the book of Judges just because it’s so weird! You know where they take that person, they cut this lady up into 12 pieces, put her on donkeys, and send her all over Israel? That’s a great story! I mean, that’s just too weird to ignore! You can’t skip over that when you’re reading the Bible! You’ve got to look at that and go, «There’s got to be something here! He wouldn’t have put it in the book if there wasn’t something significant here!»
And I’m not going to warn you ahead of time because I want to surprise you. One day we’ll get it! I love the Old Testament, and Jonah is just one of those stories! Mostly familiar with the stories is called by the Lord to go to Nineveh! Nineveh was a God—called, I think it’s four times, at least three times in the book of Jonah, God called Nineveh a great city! But it was a great city that He was going to have to judge and destroy! Now a lot of people, especially right now—for some reason—we get so far away from biblical culture that we get offended by the concept of judgment! A just—He’s still the judge! Just be glad the blood of Jesus covers you! He didn’t quit being the judge! He’s not Santa sitting on a cloud granting all our wishes! He’s a righteous and holy God who set His heart on transforming us to where we look exactly like Jesus!
Mike Bickle said it best: God’s judgment always comes against whatever interferes with love! If you have a cancerous growth on your hand, you want the doctor to judge it! You want him not to pacify it, not to console it, not to comfort it! You want him to cut it off! And so God’s judgment is always aimed at that stuff that destroys life for the rest of humanity! All right? Thankfully, we are in this wonderful, wonderful season of grace, but we better take advantage of it because He is looking for where He can extend mercy and forgiveness!
Back to Jonah: He tells Jonah to go to Nineveh, and He—and He tells them to announce to them, «Judgment is coming!» And Jonah doesn’t want to! And so he gets in a boat, and, uh, they face this horrible storm, and all the guys on the boat realize Jonah’s the problem; so they throw him overboard. A big fish comes up, eats him! Yeah! He sits in the belly of a— I want—you know we need to have some Hollywood producer guy go after this story! This is just too good! He’s swallowed by a big fish, spends three days in the belly of a big fish reviewing his life, and he repents, which is a great idea! If you find yourself in the belly of a fish! And it takes you three days to repent—you’ve got issues! You’ve got issues! The fish pukes him up on the shore!
So imagine you’re sitting there with your family having a picnic on the beach, and this big fish comes up, pukes out this prophet; he’s got seaweed all over him, his skin is bleached from the stomach acids from the fish, and he’s standing there with a message! How many of you think you might want to listen to him? It’s just a weird story! So he goes a day’s journey into Nineveh, and he preaches, and there’s this massive repentance! Two greatest revivals, in my estimation, in the Bible—one is Nineveh; the other is Ephesus in the New Testament—extraordinary turnaround of entire cities! But the Jonah story, I actually don’t want to talk to you a lot about Jonah. It’s a fascinating read. I want to talk about Nineveh! God called Nineveh a great city, and yet it was steeped in darkness.
Here’s something about sinfulness: Do you understand the devil cannot create; he can only distort! Right? Give me that paper down there! Just that paper that’s laying there on the—you know, whatever that is! I don’t know what it is, but it is now mine; thank you! All right! God created marriage—perfect harmony, husband and wife! There’s the sexual part of marriage, there’s the emotional connection, there’s the partnership, there’s the dreaming together—all this stuff! The devil can’t create this, but what he can do is distort it! He can distort what exists! And he says, «All right, sex can be enjoyed with other people besides your spouse!» He didn’t create it; he just distorted what God designed!
Are you with me? All right! So when we find sin-filled cities in the world—and let me just mention a few just to illustrate—I’m not casting stones—San Francisco, New Orleans, Amsterdam, Rio de Janeiro—we can go on and on; it’s not necessary! You get the point! Oftentimes, Christians will look at these cities with the spirit of accusation because of their sinfulness instead of realizing they are only displaying in darkness their potential in light! God saw greatness, but they were locked in this cycle of sin! But the depth of that sin only represented the height of glory that He had purposed and called them to. San Francisco is a wonderful, beautiful city, but it is steeped in sin; why? Because of the toleration of immoral things. What’s the gift? It’s a gift of extraordinary mercy! But it just got perverted; got distorted! Is this making sense?
So God calls it a great city, but it has to be judged because the sin is actually going to destroy all the people around it! And so the word comes, and they repent! We have to stop looking at the darkness of an individual, a family line, a city, a nation, and look at what God sees in that city that would make Him say, «Nineveh is a great city!» It’s a great city! Here’s—there are two or three things I want to point out, and then we’ll wrap this up.
I want you to look at verse 3 of chapter 1. Jonah, verse chapter 1, verse 3: «Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord! He went down to Joppa, found a ship going to Tarshish, he paid the fare, went down into it to go with them to Tarshish from the presence of God!» Look at verse 10: «The men who were exceedingly afraid told him, 'Why have you done this? ' They have not figured out Jonah is the problem! The men knew that he had fled from the presence of the Lord!» Here’s this theme that’s throughout Jonah’s life! Here, let me talk to you about the presence of God!
First of all, Colossians 1 says, «In Him all things consist.» Another way to say it is in Him, all things are held together! This stage—every molecule—is held in place by the actual presence of God! If His presence were to be completely removed from something, it would completely disintegrate because He is the glue, if you will, that holds everything in its place! Pantheists have it wrong because they think the tree is God! The part that is correct—and please don’t misinterpret me on this one—the part that is correct is the presence of God does hold that tree together! But the tree itself is not God!
Right? So if I’m an unbeliever, and the presence of God actually holds my being together, then we’d have to say when I’m born again, and the Holy Spirit comes and takes up residence in me, makes my body His temple, then there’s an increased dimension or measure of the presence! Are you following me? He holds me together, but I turn my life over to Jesus—He is my Lord, He is my Savior— all of a sudden the Spirit of God comes, takes up residence in me! Now, as a person in whom the Holy Spirit dwells, when I get together with two or three of you, He said, «I will be there in the midst!» But He’s already here; He’s in me; He’s already in you!
So when we come together, and He says, «I’m there in the midst!» He’s trying to let us know there is yet another dimension of presence that I’m going to gift you with! Do you understand? There are measures, layers, dimensions of presence! And—and it’s easy to become—it’s easy to live in ignorance of the more that’s available! All right, so He’s in me; I receive Christ, takes up residence in me! We meet together; He’s there in the midst! And then He says that when we give Him praise, He establishes His throne upon the praises of His people!
So here’s a group of people that are together in His name—He’s already there! And yet when we move into that time of worship, there’s a manifest presence of God that increases! A display! I’m saying all of that because it says here that Jonah was fleeing from the presence of God! In one sense, you can’t get away from Him because He’s everywhere! But that’s not what this is pointing to! It’s not trying to make a theological statement that God doesn’t exist in some place! He’s trying to let us know a secret: there is a measure of presence that you can only discover when you’re doing what you were assigned to do! He was fleeing from that! Distance himself from that! Why? Because if you can distance yourself from that, you don’t have the conviction, the torment, the pain of the result of your own disobedience!
We were born for certain assignments! I–I don’t mean that rigidly, you know. You know, you’re working at Macy’s and you should be working at Penny’s? I’m not—I’m not—I’m not doing that! But I’m just saying we were born with design! A designer designed us with purpose! And it says of David—King David says that in the time when kings go to war, he was at home on his rooftop, saw a nude woman bathing, and that’s where he fell into adultery and eventually murder! When you’re not standing in the assignment you were designed for, you’ll end up facing temptations you don’t have grace for! The safest place to be is in the middle of the assignment God gave you! You say, «Well, it’s so scary!» No, it’s scarier outside!
It’s way scarier outside! And so Jonah here is actually fleeing from the presence of the Lord because there are—when you’re doing what you were designed for, it’s almost like you’re wired to tap into this presence of God, this glory of God in ways that you can’t doing anything else! When you’re doing what you were born to do, you suddenly have access to exposure—I–I don’t know the right language—you suddenly are in a place to discover Him in ways you couldn’t anywhere else! I had a issue here—a physical challenge here a few years ago, and I remember reading—I would read, um, the 23rd Psalm probably almost every day, if not every day, for—for months among other things—but I would—I would go through that Psalm over and over and over again! And I remember when that whole season was over, I didn’t come out with heavy revelation; I–I came out with an awareness of something I was hoping to have great truths! You know, it wasn’t that! It was He said, «Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I’ll fear no evil because You’re with me!» And I came to this realization: there are measures of presence that you can’t find anywhere but in the valley of the shadow of death!
You’ve got to capture your moments! We don’t always control our moments; seldom do we control our moments! Here’s another one: «He prepares a table before me in the presence of my enemies!» Table—intimate fellowship; it’s nourishment, it’s strength, it’s communion, it’s partnership, it’s friendship, it’s belonging! And it’s in the middle of enemies! And there are some of you that are so preoccupied with the enemies that are against you that you haven’t yet discovered He’s sitting right across the table for the deepest and richest fellowship you’ve ever known in your life!
The way I like to put it is: Every time you say «I love You» to Jesus, God broadcasts it over the devil’s intercom! All right, let’s, uh, let’s wrap this up! Let me take you to one more point that I think is worthwhile; it’s in chapter three. So Jonah chapter three— that’s all right; everybody’s still alive! Before you were saved, you were just leaving the house to go out, so this is a—it’s an early night, dude! Sorry to remind you of that! You know, years ago, we had one of our elders say, «You used to tell people the only reason we bring our watch to church is to see if the date changed!» Sorry if that struck terror in your heart!
Chapter 3, verse 5: «So the people of Nineveh believed God, proclaimed a fast, put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them. Then word came to the king of Nineveh; he arose from his throne, laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth and sat in ashes! He caused it to be proclaimed and published throughout Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, 'Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything! Do not let them eat or drink water! Even animals! ' Man, this is awesome! This is like—this guy got serious! Let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily to God! Look carefully here—cry mightily to God! Yes! Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hand!»
Interesting comparison: that word «mightily» there—uh, different translations—I forget—numerous standard I was looking at this morning; it’s so—the word mightily here actually means violence! Violently! So he says cry in a violent matter to God, and let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence of his own hands! Let’s just say you’ve got a very shy, timid, brand-new mother! She’s got this beautiful little baby; she’s very shy, very sensitive, and she’s got her pride and joy down at the shopping mall! She’s got her stroller, and she looks in the window, and some man runs over, takes the stroller, and starts running off with a child! How many of you think she would still be shy? No! She turns into the mother bear; she is ready to rip somebody to pieces if she can get a hold of him! Because something got released in her where she is no longer measuring her response according to the values of people or society or culture or any—nobody is going to define that response! That response is going to be the most honest response she has maybe ever had in her entire life!
There’ll be a scream; she will run; she will do everything she possibly can to apprehend and get that child back! Am I right? Okay, this word «mightily» prayer, it’s that kind of response to God that is not measured according to culture. It is the most honest prayer you’ve ever prayed in your life! So here we have something unusual happen.
In verse 5, it states that the people of Nineveh believed and proclaimed a fast. In verse 6, it says that the word reached the king. This phenomenon has been seen throughout Israel’s history: when they had a righteous king, they behaved righteously; when they had an idolatrous, evil king, they became an idolatrous people. They almost always followed their leaders in this move of God. I want to use this as a prophetic piece in this move of God. It started with the people and created such a tidal wave, such an eruption of intercession in this city that was about to face the judgment of God. It eventually rippled all the way to the top of their culture and society, reaching the king himself. When he heard it, there was such a release of power over him that he fell instantly into conviction, and he began to move with the intercessions of his own people, which then brought about transformation.
When Jonah walked through Nineveh and announced that the judgment of God was coming, he did not say, «If you don’t repent, judgment is coming.» There was no option of repentance; all there was was a pronouncement of judgment. The important thing to see here is that in a word of judgment, the people recognized that perhaps this God who warned them was also merciful. They weren’t offended by the word of judgment; they were brought to humility and responded to the reality that He is a merciful God, a caring Father, and a forgiving God. It wasn’t even in the sermon that they heard; it wasn’t in the message that brought them to transformation. They simply heard that judgment was coming, and they instantly «hit the dirt,» so to speak, confessing their sins. Their cry was so honest and so raw that it rippled up the chain of command until the king himself was apprehended by a word of conviction.
Something stirred in my heart this morning, and I want to end with this. We know that Jesus, as we often quote, said He only spoke what He heard from His Father and only did what He saw His Father doing. I’ve read through history; I’ve gone through some of the sermons preached by great revivalists. I’ve seen recordings or videos of some of the great revivals and their messages. Now, please don’t be offended, but what they said wasn’t always that profound. Some of the books I’ve read certainly are amazing, but it’s not what I expected. The point isn’t to cast doubt on their insights; rather, it makes me hungry. You can express the simplest thing under the power of God, and it changes a life. These guys, like Wesley, would stand in a field preaching what I’m sure was profound and perfect for the day, but I want you to hear that his voice was released, driven by the voice of the Lord. It’s recorded that his voice carried over great distances, where people miles away could hear the gospel being preached with such power that it echoed through the canyons and trees. The point is the ache in our hearts—that when we speak truth, God Himself would put His hand upon it, enabling it to reach far beyond what our intelligence could accomplish.
I remember when I was 19 years old, sitting in a house we called the Salt House in Reading; it was just a drop-in center for people on drugs. It was chaotic, like every demonized person you know in California came through that house. I remember a day when this extremely intellectual guy came in. He was very demonized and loved to debate because he was intelligent enough to outmatch me on any subject. He sat down, and as I became aware of God, I said to him, «Jesus really loves you.» It was the first time in our interactions that I saw him go silent. The simplest phrase came with the breath of God, forcing him to think. I felt so good that I repeated it, and he could argue no more. I will never forget that. It was like slow-motion—when I said it the first time, my hand was on it; when I did the same 30 seconds later, it didn’t carry the same weight. This has caused me to hunger. I’ve realized that I’m not truly impressed with any of my ideas; I desire His. I want to speak when He speaks and be silent when He’s silent. I want to take bold action when it’s important and stand still when it matters. All I want is to know your heart, your presence, your countenance, and your voice. All I want is to represent you well.
So why don’t you stand, and we’ll wrap this up. You’ve made it through the strangest teaching on Jonah you’ve heard in your life, but we survived it. John Wesley would preach in fields where thousands gathered. People in the back tried to climb trees for a better view, and he was known for preaching with such power that people would fall over. They warned those in the trees, «Don’t climb the trees!» but they would anyway. When the power of God was released, they couldn’t hang on and would fall out of the trees. People would ask, «Why did God knock them out of the trees?» He didn’t knock them out; He just showed up. Let’s get hungry, let’s humble ourselves, and pray. Some of you will stand in the courts of kings not armed with a profound word but with one that He breathes. When you say it, it will pierce hearts and change the hearts of leaders.
So here’s all I know to do: humble yourself, pray, and cry out, «God, I want to represent You well.» I don’t pray this in fear; I pray this passionately. I want to say what You’re saying, to be silent when You’re silent. Then you get to a public place and trust Him to direct you. If it works, give Him the praise; if it doesn’t, go back to the quiet place and say, «God, I want to represent You well.» Father, I pray this over us as a body of believers, friends gathered from all over. Heighten our ability to hear and give us the courage to do what You’re doing, to say what You’re saying, and the courage to be silent, even when we have great ideas. Help us to know the movements of Your presence and heart, for we truly want to establish Your kingdom on earth so that You would be glorified. I pray this in Jesus' wonderful name. Amen. Now we’re going to do some ministry. Come on up, Joel; I’ll give it to you in a moment.
I first want to ask, anytime we have a crowd this size, there’s always a chance someone here has never surrendered their life to the Lord Jesus Christ, the King, the Savior of all—the one who died with you in mind. I ask everyone to stop moving around, as I would hate for someone who needs to come to Jesus to be distracted. If there is anyone here who would say, «Bill, I don’t want to leave this building until I know I’ve received forgiveness from God and have been brought into His family as an adopted son or daughter, truly a disciple of this wonderful Jesus,» I want you to put a hand up right where you are. We’ll pray together quickly. I want to make sure everyone is in. All right, I’ll assume you’re all in then. Thank you, Lord. Amen. Souls and more souls, every generation saved and set free, carrying kingdom revelation. Souls and more souls, souls and more souls. Amen.