Bill Johnson - Winning the Battle Over Your Mind
We recognize that the devil doesn’t come to us in a red suit with horns and a pitchfork. He doesn’t make himself known as the devil; rather, he presents himself as something we would value. He actually has to parade his thoughts as virtuous in order for us to embrace them. Open your Bibles to Romans chapter 12. We’re going to start there. I’m going to talk to you about a subject that I’ve discussed repeatedly, and sometimes I wonder if I don’t address it for my own sake while you just happen to be in the room. I think that might be the case, but I’m going to talk about the renewed mind again, hopefully from a slightly different angle.
The mind is a battleground; we know that. Herein lies part of our challenge: we know that we can do nothing without Him. Our problem is that we’ve learned to do nothing with Him. Acts 10:38 says that Jesus went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him. When God is with someone, the impossible is expected to happen. The renewed mind is a huge part of this journey. Ephesians chapter 6 gives us a metaphorical picture of armor and how it protects the life of a Believer. There’s the helmet of salvation, the breastplate of righteousness, and the shield of faith. In that shield of faith, we catch and extinguish the flaming darts of the enemy.
Imagine a soldier holding up a shield to stop the flaming dart, the arrow from the enemy, from piercing them. Faith absorbs the illegal thoughts and suggestions of the enemy. If an arrow gets past the shield, if it gets past our faith, it actually wounds us. There’s a second tool God gave us: the sword of the Spirit, which is not a long sword for fighting, like in The Three Musketeers, but rather, in the original language, it is like an 18-inch dagger, suitable for hand-to-hand combat. If an arrow gets past the shield of faith, it is that sword, that word, that digs out the lie.
It is important to identify the lies that come our way, but it is equally essential that we recognize the truth that replaces it. Truth is not merely to be glanced at in daily readings; it is to be memorized, prayed, and meditated on. What happens with the lies of the enemy is that they always war against our identity in Christ, and I’ll try to show that to you in a moment. Every lie that the enemy has ever suggested or thrown your way exists to war against what you know about Him. When we entertain lies, we actually create an arena for the enemy’s thoughts to war against the mind of Christ.
Now, the devil can never defeat the enemy, so don’t take this further than I intend; we create an arena where, when we entertain the thoughts of the enemy, those thoughts war against what we know about God and can actually undermine our understanding. I’m not saying the enemy ever has power over the Lord because he never does. What I am suggesting is that there are seasons in which what we think and what we determine can actually affect the outcome of what God desires. Mark chapter 7 presents a scary example, where the gospel writer is quoting Jesus, who says, «You by your traditions have made the word of God of no effect.»
What is more powerful than the word of God? Nothing. It is the most powerful thing in the universe. Yet you and I get to vote with what we meditate on. When you empower a lie, you empower the liar. So, it is possible, in that moment, through tradition or through misplaced religious values—those not built on the mind of Christ—to undermine the power of the word of God. He said, «You make the word of God of no effect.» The truth has all of Heaven behind it, while a lie has nothing behind it except inferior demonic powers. Still, in the moment that the lie is presented to me, because of the authority I have in Christ, I can empower the lie to undermine the word of the Lord over my life.
That was a good point. Just keep trying; don’t quit. Faith absorbs and extinguishes lies, and faith is anchored in the word of God while discovering the nature of God. Every lie aims to undermine our position in Christ, our self-esteem, and our sense of design and purpose.
Now, let’s delve into this passage from Romans 12. If you have your Bibles, let me see them. Alright, close enough. Romans 12, verse 1: «I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.»
For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. Let’s read it again: «For I say to you through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.»
I’d like to suggest that your thoughts anchored in actual faith are greater than what you can imagine. Thoughts expressed by authentic faith are actually greater than your wildest dreams. The difference is that thoughts anchored in faith are rooted in reality. Thoughts of your imagination often need to be bolstered and kept in place.
I know people who live to protect their self-esteem; they can’t accept correction because any bit of correction threatens their self-esteem. You see it with Saul and David when the women sang, «Saul has killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands.» Any good leader who is secure in his identity is encouraged by those he empowers to be successful. However, when you live to protect your own self-identity, it’s all props, superficial stuff that upholds it, which makes us prone to insecurity and jealousy when we don’t understand who Jesus says we really are.
Anyone who discovers who God made them to be will never want to be anyone else. It is who God made us to be that is important. This is such a critical area that Jesus was actually verbally assaulted and tempted in Luke 4 when Satan approached Him in the wilderness during His 40-day fast. The first thing he addressed was identity. The battle for identity is so significant that it has become an epidemic—a lost sense of identity. It’s a pandemic and it’s contagious; people who believe lies inspire others to believe the same lies to protect that false sense of identity.
When you believe a lie, you have to feed it with more lies to protect it. Real faith is not the expression of self-determination; rather, real faith comes from surrender. You cannot determine yourself into great faith, but you can surrender yourself into great faith because you are a Believer, and Believers believe as part of their nature.
Nehemiah mentions, on four separate occasions in one chapter, that they were trying to frighten him, trying to instill fear, discourage him through fear, and stop the work. In what, 18 or 20 verses? Four times, he mentions the issue of fear. I remind you what you already know: the number one command in Scripture is, «Do not fear.» It’s repeated most often because it is the most needed instruction. Everything we do in life is motivated by either love or fear.
What fear does is it drives my mind into forbidden territory. The devil doesn’t wear a red suit with horns and a pitchfork. He comes to us as an angel of light. In other words, he approaches us with inspired thoughts, insights about another person, which then leads to gossip, slander, rumor, and criticism. Therefore, being grounded and continuously connected to the presence of God enables us to tell the mood of the Lord when we are about to compromise through a bad declaration or confession.
We must possess the conviction of heart, realizing, «I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m not going there.» I may not know everything happening, but I can’t compromise here. We have these warnings in Scripture and in the presence of God to keep us from fear, and the reason is that fear always leads to sin. Psalms 37, I believe it’s verse 8, says, «Fret not; do not fear; it only leads to evil doing.» Thus, if I’m standing in a place of fear, I have two options: I can either repent and get out of it or I can choose to sin.
Repenting means I acknowledge that I’ve been believing a lie. I’ve been entertaining thoughts and ideas that war against my destiny. I’ve been embracing values that are contrary to my design in Christ. «God, forgive me; I’ve compromised my own soul.» It’s not a moment for shame but rather a moment of deliverance—a moment to forsake what contaminates my heart and alters my perception.
In that place of fear, which we all face, you probably haven’t dealt with it, but you know someone who has—likely another Christian in town who could use this, and you might be able to talk to them. We’ve all been in that place of fear. The only way out is to repent, and you won’t do it through personal discipline, saying, «I’m just going to think positive thoughts.» It has to be through the word. If you’ve believed a lie, replace it with truth. If you’ve partnered with that spirit of jealousy or anything else, begin to embrace the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life to keep you alert to what’s happening around you so you don’t fall for those same tricks. Amen.
Now, I want to start, as I said, at the end, which I’ve already done, but I want you to go to verse 13. Here’s an interesting thing. Verse 13 says, «For this reason, he was hired…» What’s going on here is that prophets were actually hired. So they weren’t non-profit prophets; they were for-profit prophets. Yes, I know it’s a bit thin, but it’s alright. They were hired to prophesy incorrectly into Nehemiah’s life to instill fear. The enemy works hard to reward those who criticize you.
The book of Proverbs discusses how stolen bread is sweet to the taste, but it turns to gravel—that’s the reward; it initially feels sweet and gratifying, but it always backfires. Alright, verse 13 again: «For this reason, he was hired, so that I should be afraid and act that way and sin, so that they might have cause for an evil report that they might reproach me.»
I’m going to make you think here this morning. They were hired to prophesy incorrectly so that I would fear, act from fear, and sin. The end result would be that they would have an evil report against me. He didn’t say, «Act in sin so they could take my life.» He said, «If I act in sin, I will actually empower the slander that will work against me.» Wow! By acting in fear, I legitimize evil reports.
Let’s go to verse 1 and see if we can make it through this lovely little story. Alright? Yeah, you’ve only got 20 minutes, so you’re going to get off easy today.
First of all, let’s get moving. «It happened when Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall and that there were no breaks left in it, though at that time I had not hung the doors in the gates, Sanballat and Geshem sent to me saying, 'Come, let us meet together among the villages in the plain of Ono.'» But they thought to do me harm.
So I sent messengers to them, saying, «I’m doing a great work, so I cannot come down. Why should the work cease while I leave it and come down to you?» They sent this message to me four times, and I answered in the same manner.
I love this part of the story, and I love the whole story, actually. Here, you have a picture of Nehemiah receiving a letter from political leaders who are enemies of Israel. They say, «You’ve got something going on there; we need to have a conversation, so why don’t you meet us in this valley and we’ll talk?»
There are too many times when Christians entertain conversations with the devil. What insulates us from the appeal of such conversation is knowing our purpose. Now, understand I’m not speaking of a literal conversation; I’m talking about ideas entertained where the enemy has a voice in the way we think and feel.
Here, the enemy sends this note, and Nehemiah responds, «Why should this great work that I’m doing stop while I come and talk to you?» That should be the response of every person in this room. «Why should this great work I’m doing stop?» But you must first be involved in that great work; it has to be legitimate.
As I mentioned to you a few weeks ago, we know that we can do nothing without Him; our real problem is that we’ve learned to do nothing with Him. This means we are fully engaged in whatever role we have in the ongoing work of Christ on Earth. It doesn’t necessarily mean the work of Christ involves preaching to thousands; for some, it may involve working as auto mechanics in Jesus' name and impacting their part of the world with the culture of Christ.
So here he says, «Come meet with us,» and Nehemiah says, «No.» Listen to this: «He answered in the same manner four times.» What often happens for believers is that when the enemy keeps banging on the door with the same distraction—here, that was the first tool, distraction—he weakens our confession due to fatigue.
Oftentimes, we are very bold in our declarations at first, but over time, we weaken our confession and our profession of faith. When it says Nehemiah answered in the same manner all four times, they sent this accusation to him. If the mind were not important, it wouldn’t be worth renewing.
The intellect of the individual is so profound that Jesus went through great lengths to protect that mind, knowing that the unrenewed mind is hostile toward Him and is at war with God, according to Romans 8. He takes the risk to protect something and to keep people independent in their thinking so they can hear what He is saying and do what He is doing, illustrating Heaven on Earth to demonstrate the actual will of God through their yielded imagination.
A yielded imagination becomes the sanctified imagination. A sanctified imagination is postured to hear and see from God. I believe there is a whole new release of creativity about to take place through the church for the sake of the world, for the nations—in medicine, science, technology, and other areas.
Let me insert that it wouldn’t be good for all creative ideas to come from the church. We’ve become too proud, arrogant, and independent, thinking we are something. Thankfully, the Lord knows the measure. But I do believe that if we reposition ourselves in our thinking, He will release ideas to us.
The renewed mind is the target of the Lord in your life every single day. He is constantly speaking to us and leading us into experiences and encounters that will reposition our thinking. This is not just creatively, but it’s about thinking like Christ. The renewed mind creates a context for faith.
It is important to understand: faith doesn’t come from the mind. The Bible states, «It is with the heart man believes unto righteousness.» Thus, faith is not an intellectual matter, but the renewed mind creates a context for faith, much like the banks of a river create a context for the river to flow.
It was the centurion who understood the ways of God and the nature of the Kingdom that caused Jesus to respond with great admiration for his understanding, calling it faith. He said, «Go your way; your servant lives.» So, any present understanding he called faith.
Faith is often demonstrated through kingdom understanding. It is not the product of self-discipline. I believe discipline is important, and I can downplay it somewhat, so forgive me for that; someone else will balance it out, and it won’t be me. I do believe in discipline.
However, it creates the context for something to happen. Faith comes from surrender, not striving. It’s the product of yielding to the Spirit of God, the Word of God, and the experiences He takes us into that enable us to think and see differently.
There are indeed enemies to the renewed mind. Everything the enemy would want to do in our lives is meant to disengage us from the renewed mind. The reason is that he wants people to think in ways that, although they seem logical and reasonable, are actually hostile toward God and the ways of God. The mindset on the flesh, Romans 8 tells us, is hostile toward God; it’s not neutral.
The mindset on the flesh isn’t just having a bad day; it’s at war with the things of God. It’s important to grasp this. But the mindset on the Spirit is life and peace, and the mindset on the Spirit is capable of great faith.
A couple more comments, and then we’ll read. Did I tell you where to go? James 3? No? How many of you are there? I’m supposed to say how many discerning people are in the room—none? Well, I’ll give you another chance: James chapter 3. Turn there in your Bibles, and we’ll read out of there in just a moment.
Now, I perceive something like the phrase «looking through a glass darkly.» That’s where I’m standing right now; I’m peers through glass and can’t see clearly. But I do see this: the scripture says that by faith we understand that the worlds were made out of nothing.
I believe the Lord is introducing us to understandings that will benefit humanity—an understanding that doesn’t exalt you or me as some Christian smartypants. God is not interested in elevating the believer for applause and worship. He wants to elevate the notion that He has the entire world in His heart and there are practical solutions for every problem.
He understands what those solutions are, and surrendered, yielded people will come into those solutions. I believe that as we grow in our own faith in these areas, there will be more dreams, more visions, more simple revelations. At times, a dream and a vision seem supernatural, but sometimes you work hard and arrive at a right conclusion, and that is also the work of God.
Sometimes our teams involved in writing songs will experience these moments where songs just seem to come. From my conversations with Brian, I know that two-thirds of the song may be written, but the last third is grinded out over a period of time, and both processes are necessary. Does that make sense?
I believe the Lord will release understanding for creative solutions, expressions, and more. Now, let’s go to James chapter 3.
What we’ll see here is we recognize that the devil doesn’t arrive in a red suit with horns and a pitchfork. He doesn’t make himself known as the devil; instead, he presents himself as something we value. He has to parade his thoughts as virtuous thoughts for us to embrace them. That was a good point, Joe!
He comes to us as the angel of light, so he has to approach us in a way we perceive as virtuous. The problem is that this way of living or thinking does not bring peace or bear the fruit of righteousness. Let’s examine this passage from James chapter 3.
Verse 13 argues, «Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom.» I love that phrase, «meekness of wisdom.» My goodness, don’t pursue wisdom without meekness, nor think you have it unless there’s meekness. Meekness is not weakness; it’s yielded strength.
The biblical illustration of meekness is the wild horse that becomes trained. It remains powerful enough to jump the largest fence; it only does so at the commander’s word.
Verse 14 says, «If you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth.» This wisdom does not descend from above but is earthly, sensual, and demonic. Wherever envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there.
But the wisdom that comes from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.
Go back to verses 14 and 15. «If you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth.» Notice this phrase: «This wisdom does not descend from above but is earthly, sensual, and demonic.» The key here is that bitterness, offense, jealousy, and envy can appear to carry the guise of wisdom. That’s why a Christian might embrace it.
Wow! It can make us feel discerning, yet it doesn’t bear the fruit of peace or righteous living. If I were to identify what I perceive as the number one enemy at work in the body of Christ over the last two years, it would be offense.
This issue connects directly to what I just mentioned; it presents itself as wisdom and comes with rationale. Have you ever met a bitter person who didn’t have a good reason? It’s their reasoning. Offense operates similarly. Offense leads a multitude of people to vote for actions they fundamentally oppose. It dramatically sways people because it appears wise, yet it’s not wise.
I have been on a little journey over the past six months. I don’t want even a trace of offense in my heart about anything, ever. I specifically do not want to live under that influence. I’m one of the most forgiving people I know—which, yes, is an arrogant thing to say—but I genuinely am quick to forgive.
Still, I asked the Lord to show me any area where I might have offense. You don’t have to be bitter to be influenced by offense. You can unknowingly live under the influence of offense without realizing it.
Guard your heart; don’t let it cloud your vision or thinking. I’ve been requesting the Lord to show me these things; random memories would resurface, like something someone said to me in high school! Really? Do we have to go that far back?
Or maybe I will recall something done recently. Just random moments, like a conversation at the Chicago airport with a man who formed particular opinions about me. I could visualize his face and the settings. I tell myself, «I give up my right to be offended.»
I release that right. The lady who flipped me off while driving? I pull over and engage her in conversation: «I give up my right to be offended.» The money that was stolen, the dishonesty in that transaction—I give up my right to be offended.»
Then, something powerful occurs in my heart. I don’t know how else to express this. Something incredible transpires within me. Even when I think of the man who critiqued my eternal destination at the airport here in Redding—I can still picture his face. «I give up my right to be offended.»
To go even further, I pray for great mercy and grace for them. The essence is that I don’t want the poison of offense clouding my vision or impacting my thinking; it does manage to do so.
That is the very target—the aim is to allow bitterness, envy, any of these things to influence our reasoning so we cannot replicate God’s heart on Earth to the degree He desires.