Bill Johnson - The People God Chooses to Fulfill His Plans
The least qualified person was qualified by grace, and in a moment, she went from being an immoral woman with a horrible reputation to an evangelist who brought an entire city to faith in Christ. Nice to see you! Wow, wow, wow! How many of you were at Holy Ghost last night? If you were not there, it is still available for streaming online at Bethel TV, so go there. Just trust me; watch it, watch it, watch it! Darren, thanks to Darren Wilson, Janelle’s wonderful wife, and the whole team. Why don’t all of you who are here for the premiere of Holy Ghost stand? Let’s bless and welcome them! Beautiful, beautiful! Let it go! Thanks, beautiful! We are so, so thankful for how God is using the films that Darren produced.
How many of you have seen Finger of God? Yeah, almost everyone! Furious Love, Father of Lights, Holy Ghost… hands just keep going up! I love it; so fun! Thanks so much, Todd White, good to have you here, Brian, great to have you here! It’s just fun! And thanks to the whole team for showing up. We had such a fun time yesterday. It’s a real honor that they give us to host this kind of event here in Reading, and a whole bunch of you thought the same and showed up, and it was wonderful. Anyway, thank you! Thanks for making films that make us think. Oh, in fact, I would just like to sit down and show the whole film right now; that’s really what I’d like to do, but we don’t have time. However, I do want to encourage you on that one—that’s a really powerful film.
We’ve got a testimony. Where’s the mic? Why don’t you give it to me? Why don’t you come on up here? We have a wonderful testimony. I was in Denver, goodness, how long ago? About a year and a half ago—yeah, a year and a half or so ago. Randy Clark had a healing school, and we’re going to pray for some folks with issues here in just a heartbeat. But I wanted you to hear a really cool testimony first on how God healed this man. I want you to know in heaven, I will impress you with my size.
Former NFL player had an injury; tell us what Jesus did. Yes, I played several years in the NFL, and I was a middle linebacker, so basically, my head was used as a weapon regularly and often. After retiring from football, I was at times plagued with depression, suicidal thoughts. I was a pastor of a church in Denver, and even as a leader, the shame that came with it at times was overwhelming anxiety, depression, and suicidal thinking. When Bill was there and the team was praying, you did an altar call. As I was sitting there, my head felt like it was on fire. I felt like I needed to go run and put it in a bucket of water somewhere. It was like shards of glass were being pulled out of my very head. I got instantly healed. I know it! And from that point on, we’ve seen a shift in our region in some of those dimensions as well. Personally, just being able to wake up free from that weight, that fear, and heaviness—now he’s healed. As we know, when you get delivered, now we pray for people with head trauma, brain injuries, learning disabilities, and we’ve seen God do some amazing miracles. So thank you so much for your faithfulness.
We just thank Him so much! What you described about the pain there in Denver, I remember when I first got the testimony, you described the pain that you lived with. What was it like? Just describe what you felt on a daily basis. On a daily basis—definitely on a weekly basis—I would just get hit with shame, discouragement, and real suicidal thoughts in such a way that I knew how to fight—but there comes that point when you get worn down, and you get beat down enough that you kind of retreat. Then the effects upon your family—I have an unbelievable wife, and I’m just so grateful that that has lifted off the entire family. That weight, that heaviness, and that depression comes at strategic times, and to see that lifted has been just a miracle in the grace of God. Thank you, Lord Jesus! Wonderful! Thank you for doing that!
Anyone in pain? You know what, let’s just go wholesale—anyone in pain, stand up! Anyone in pain, let’s bring an end to it now! We’re going to pray and go to the root cause of it. It doesn’t matter what it is; if it’s an old injury, if you played in the NFL and used your head as a weapon, it doesn’t matter what it is. You are qualified because of the grace of God for a miracle—not someday, but right now! The Lord is going to release a creative miracle for some of you—in the spine, where there’s damage in the spine or degenerative conditions in joints, hip joints, etc.—where there is decay or debilitating pain as a result. The Lord is healing you even right now! There’s also someone here who has had an ongoing popping in the left ear; if that makes sense to you, stand up, because this is your moment as well. All right, this is your day!
All right, church, you guys know what to do! These folks need a miracle; you have the authority to give it to them! So stand next to them, find out where it hurts, the cause, and let’s go after it right now! You don’t need a long interview—just real brief! In the authority of the name of Jesus, we declare this ends today! The cycle of torment and pain ends today! Shame is connected to some of these folks who are standing, and in light of the testimony we just had, we break off shame—the depression and the things that come because of sustained issues in the body! We just break that off in Jesus' name! If it’s any kind of head trauma, I want you to lift it off their head as though it was something you could see, as something you could grab hold of—just lift it off! Declare over them prophetically, «It ends today in Jesus' name!» If you can’t reach someone, just extend your hand; be a part of the miracle! Just be praying for someone at a distance. Thank you, Lord! We invite you, Holy Spirit, to exaggerate the healing presence and power of God, just to increase for breakthrough now, for the glory of the name of Jesus!
Inside of the left knee, pain is dissolving in Jesus' name! Cartilage damage in the right knee—bend right now! Bend it now! Watch what the Lord has done! We declare healing over that in Jesus' name! All right, everyone that just received prayer, check yourself out really, really good! Anyone who just got healed—if all the pain is gone, symptoms are gone—wave both hands over your head for about 10 seconds! Church, look around you! Let’s give thanks to the Lord! Over here, there, there, back over here, some more here and there! All right, how many of you can’t say the pain is gone, but there’s improvement? Put your hands up—wave your hands! Yep, bless the Lord for that! We thank you, Lord! We just pray right now for a completion of what you’ve started. We just declare that in the mighty name of Jesus—a completion of what’s been started. Thanks, Lord! Amen!
Go ahead and sit down. I want you to open your Bibles to Isaiah 61, Isaiah chapter 61. I think I could honestly say the three most important chapters in my life in the last 40-some years have been Isaiah 60, 61, and 62. They’ve shaped my thinking and my value system. I had an encounter with the Lord in May of 1979, Thursday afternoon, over the 60th chapter of Isaiah. I won’t get into that now; it’s not important. I’ve done it before; it’s not necessary today. But Isaiah 61 starts with a portion of Scripture that Jesus quoted at literally the beginning of His ministry. Now think about this: before Jesus multiplied food, healed the sick, raised the dead, or did anything, He stands in front of Israel, in front of a group of people, and He makes a pronouncement. He says, «The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me.» Then He tells why—He makes a confession of faith about what the Father was going to do in and through Him because the Spirit of God was on Him.
Now, the Holy Spirit is what qualifies us for the impossible. One person and the Holy Spirit equal no impossibilities! The Holy Spirit is what qualifies us—not only qualifies us, but in a sense urges or commissions us into the realm of the impossible! Jesus models this for us. He is eternally God; He never stopped being God, but He took a season of time on planet Earth where He lived as a man dependent on God to work through Him. And this announcement—we’re going to read Isaiah 61:1—"The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to console those who mourn in Zion; to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.»
All right, we’re going to read on, but just hold on for a moment. Jesus makes this announcement about His target. His target is broken people. It’s to shattered minds; it’s to people that are depressed, overwhelmed by life, diseased, afflicted—you name it—any kind of brokenness is His target. At one point in His ministry, He was talking to a crowd that included a group of Pharisees, and He announced to them that only the sick need a physician. What He was doing was saying, «I am here as the physician, but unless you realize your need for healing, I have no value to you.» In other words, the Pharisees were the most diseased people in the crowd, but their unwillingness to recognize their need disqualified them for the miracle.
When Jesus came to John the Baptist to be baptized in water, John knew he was not qualified to baptize the Son of God. He wasn’t qualified to untie His shoes, but somehow, realizing he wasn’t qualified is what qualified him. Listen to the patterns of thought for the kingdom: The Lamb of God will be seated on the throne for eternity. Why? Because we can never forget the cross. There will never be a moment in a hundred billion years from now where we lose the gratefulness for the offering of the Lamb of God. If that reality exists in eternity, then how much more are we to maintain that sense of gratefulness for what He has done? Because what happens is we develop an artificial maturity, and that artificial maturity becomes big in concepts, big in thoughts, but low in experience and low in gratefulness. And when there’s no gratefulness, there’s no dependency.
So the Lord is raising up a group of people that never lose touch with the reality of the cross. What happens in this passage? Jesus prophesies His intent, and in this intent, He says the broken are going to be healed, the shattered minds are going to be restored. I love the statement, «Beauty for ashes.» God is the God who invented beauty, and not only did He invent beauty; holiness is beautiful. As the Lord restores our understanding of what holiness is, we will be infatuated with the beauty of holiness and pursue it with every breath—every part of our being.
In this little outline of ministry that He gives, He says, «I’m going to give beauty for ashes, the recovery of sight to the blind; I’m going to heal the brokenhearted.» He comes to this conclusion: all these broken people are going to become trees of righteousness. In other words, the unstable are going to be stable; the insecure are going to be secure; the shattered are going to be restored. Some translations say not just trees of righteousness, but oaks of righteousness. In Weaverville, our only source of heat was wood heat. We would often drive the roads of the mountains up there. They would go in and clear timber out of an area, cutting in the roads to the hillsides. If it was 20 or 30 years ago, then trees would grow in the roadways, and whenever we were looking for wood or animals, we would just drive over the pine trees because they would bend. We’d get past them, go get the wood we needed, or those animals, and there was no damage to the tree—it just bent.
But whenever we saw an oak tree, that would hurt your car! Those things are so strong and so sturdy. I remember the first time I came up to one. It didn’t do what the last tree did, and here the Lord is saying that the most broken among you are going to be not just trees that are stable, but they are going to be trees of righteousness. In other words, the very thing they were weakest in, they will become the strongest in. Grace moves you from great weakness and failure to great strength and sustainable success for the long haul, and that is good news!
Now we’re going to read on because this is only the beginning of the story. Verse 4 says, «And they will rebuild the old ruins; they will raise up the former desolations; they will repair ruined cities, the desolations of many generations.» Who is «they»? They in this passage are the broken. Now, how many of you, before Jesus changed your life, were one of the broken ones? All right, that’s us! This tells us the purpose for every redeemed life. Every person in this room, every person that has experienced that healing touch, the forgiveness of God, and the restorative grace—the impartation of presence and the adoption into the family of God has a purpose. You have been drafted into an army that is to rebuild cities.
Now, when we talk about rebuilding cities, we’re not talking about just houses and buildings and stores. We’re talking about something that is culturized by Heaven itself—that’s actually influenced and shaped by a value system of another world that becomes superimposed over this one until this city actually mirrors the design of God for heaven itself. When Jesus came, there was an announcement. I want you to think about this: there was an announcement that said, «Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace and good will toward men.» Can you imagine Him saying, «Here’s the Messiah! Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace and good will towards men?» But don’t get your hopes up—it’s several thousand years away! I just wanted you to know what we’re going to do eventually, so this really isn’t even for you. No, it was given because it became possible when it was declared.
The power is always in the declared word, and He sent His word and healed them! That’s where the power is—in the word of God! That’s where the nature, the DNA of God Himself is: in the very word He speaks! «Glory to God in the highest, and on earth…» There are parallel worlds—this world affected by what’s going on in that world. In other words, on earth as it is in heaven—this is, I think, a profound chapter. We covered this a while back when I did a series for nine weeks on wisdom and the nature of Solomon’s wisdom for transformational impact on society.
And talked about this then, but here’s the deal that I want to bring to your attention this morning: the key to restored cities is found in how we value broken people. The poorest of the poor are to become the richest in the things of God—to lead the restructuring and rebuilding of cities. The Lord gave me a word years ago that He was going to take the ones rejected by the elite and give them such an anointing and breakthrough that the elite would actually feed from the rejected to get personally restored. This word is so profound because Jesus says this anointing qualifies me to do this: the restoration of the most broken, impossible situations imaginable. But it doesn’t end there. Those folks become the builders!
I was thinking this morning about sometimes the way new believers or someone with a problem or issue—as a new believer—are treated. I’ve seen it in various places. Honestly, I don’t see it here, but I chuckle sometimes at the way instant maturity is expected. What would happen if we had a little nine-month-old child who stood up, and he was standing and wanting to walk as badly as he could, but he fell? What happens if church leadership treated that child the way many new believers are treated? Well, I really don’t think he has a heart to walk. I don’t know; I don’t think it’s his desire. I don’t think it’s in him! I think there are some flaws! And another guy says, «I think he needs to study the word more.» I think if he just studied the word, I mean, we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us; it’s obvious he doesn’t believe that! He just needs to get to know his Bible. If he knew his Bible, he’d be walking!
Another guy says, «I think the issue is faith. I mean, it says we walk by faith, not by sight. If he really knew what is going on here, he would be walking for sure!» Someone else says, «I don’t know! I’m discerning a generational issue here; I’ll bet you his parents fell! In fact, I’ll bet you his grandparents fell! I think there’s a cycle here we need to break. Because I’ll tell you, if we don’t break this, this kid’s going to live with a lifetime of issues!» And someone else says, «I think it’s a demon! In fact, yep, it’s definitely a demon!»
You know, it’s silly when you put it in that context. The kid that has this insatiable desire to learn to grow to advance models childlikeness for the entire church, and we would never treat a baby that way—a young child that way. Instead, what does the child need to walk? He needs the parent who grabs their hands and says, «All right, walk! Walk!» And then we let go and say, «All right, follow me! Come to Daddy!» We back up the entire time. And when they fall, we never curse the fall; we always celebrate the steps! We celebrate the progress! We count the steps! It was five steps today! Grandma; that was five steps today! And that’s the way it is.
And it’s a different kind of kingdom, because these people who were so shattered that couldn’t function socially—the ones that have been tormented through an abusive past, it doesn’t matter what it is—are so beat up by religion. It doesn’t matter if it’s the goody-goody sin or the dark, horrible sin; it doesn’t matter—everyone needs Jesus! And that restorative process doesn’t always happen in a day. We need some moms and dads that will take the fingers and hands and say, «All right, two more steps! Two more steps!» You never write in the journal, «He took three steps and fell.» You write, «He took three steps!» Because the fall is insignificant! I’m not talking moral failure; I’m talking about just the process of life, learning to carry this thing that God has given us.
Why? Because there’s a destiny that kid who took two steps today is a rebuilder of ruined cities! And we see—we think, we pray, we live with this burning conviction «I’m raising a world changer!» It’s not just the children in my home, my grandchildren—it’s the people I run into; it’s the people I do life with—world changers, city builders, city restorers.
I want you to look at the passage of Scripture in John chapter 4. It’s a wonderful story of the woman at the well. The greatest revelation, in my opinion, about worship is in this chapter. And right after this incredible revelation on worship is what I consider to be the greatest revelation on evangelism: «Lift up your eyes, round about, and see—the harvest is white unto harvest. They are all harvestable now,» and this is a great revelation on the harvest being prepared right now, and it follows the greatest revelation on worship! I just don’t think it’s an accident because evangelism, in its greatest form—purest form—is an overflow of worship.
And here the Lord has this conversation with the lady. I want to set the stage for you. Jesus has told His disciples not to minister to the Samaritans. It’s not because He doesn’t love Samaritans; it’s because He was given a period of time in which He was to minister to the Jews, and in their rejection, He would be crucified. After the crucifixion, the gospel is for everyone. So this is before the crucifixion; this is before the rejection. He tells His disciples, «Do not minister to the Samaritans or the Gentiles.»
So Jesus is sitting at a well, and He sees a woman sitting there, and He begins dialoguing with her. He begins to talk with her! In fact, He says, «You know, if you knew who was sitting here next to you, you’d be asking me for a drink.» The disciples walk up and see Him talking, and they’re stunned because, number one, He’s talking to a woman, and a great religious leader like this shouldn’t be; and number two, He’s talking to a Samaritan. He’s got this interaction going on because He felt the pleasure of the Lord over this woman!
Now listen, when we try to live by principle, we try to always do what’s best for people, but when you live by the presence, you discover the pleasure of the Lord for people, and you delight in their experience or in what God is working and doing in them! The pleasure of the Lord is different; you feel the pleasure of the Lord over people! And it takes care of all the things that you and I would be deficient in in ministry to people, because you never have to be burdened enough, qualified enough, gifted enough—because you’re partnering with the one who is all those things and more. Living from the presence is the solution to every ministry situation!
Now, let’s read this story. Verse 22—excuse me, verse 23—"The hour is coming, and now is, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.» All right—just stop right there for a moment. God looks for worship, no; He looks for worshippers. Why? Because God, as love, always chooses the best, and we always become like whatever we worship. So God could want nothing better for you and me than for us to be worshippers. Why? Because we become like the one we worship! And so, out of love, He looks for us to step into our place and position of worship.
So those who worship must worship in spirit and in truth. In spirit means directed, led by the Holy Spirit; in truth means nothing hidden. It means our life is an open book in worship—the good, the bad, the ugly—everything as we involve everything as an offering to the Lord. The good days, the bad days, it does not matter, because it’s never determined by how I feel; it’s determined by who He is. Worship is our response to His worth.
So here is this word that He gives to the woman at the well: «In verse 39, many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, 'He told me all that I ever did.'» So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them. He stayed there two days, and many more believed because of His own word. What’s happening here? These hungry Samaritans who are not qualified for what Jesus is speaking—Jesus is speaking at a moment that’s at His Old Testament; they are supposed to wait until the New Covenant—but their hunger changes the season!
Hunger enables people to pull into their day what was actually reserved for another day! We see this countless times throughout Scripture! So here is a season shift, and Jesus stays there for two days, even though He told His disciples not to do this. Why? Because in God’s sovereignty, He wrote you and me into the equation so that we actually have influence through our life, our offering, our cries, our hunger, and thirst—these things actually have an effect on the unfolding of divine events.
All right, verse 41 again—"Many more believed because of His own word.» Verse 42, our last verse: «Then they said to the woman, 'Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him, and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.'» All right, what happened here? This woman has issues; she’s had many husbands and is living with a man now. She is an immoral woman up to this moment when God speaks to her.
Jesus speaks to this most unqualified woman, giving her the greatest revelation on worship and evangelism in the Bible—gives it to this unqualified person! You would think He would give this revelation to Paul or someone, but instead, He gives it to the least qualified, because that’s often the person that is going to be the most grateful. We too often think it’s human talent, training, years of experience; I’ve been praying for 20 years for those things that qualify for the things of God intentionally, and a spirit of entitlement comes to our life as believers.
Entitlement gives the spirit of poverty a home; entitlement creates a thankless environment for believers. Entitlement gives way to self-promotion; self-promotion comes where there’s entitlement. Why? Because self-promotion says, «I’m going to make sure I get what’s coming to me; no one else will do it. I’ll make sure it comes to me.» The problem with self-promotion is it’s like a tire that you have to keep inflated, and it’s got a leak. You have to constantly pump it up to keep it alive. When it’s God’s promotion, He sustains it. When it’s your promotion, you have to sustain it, and it’s exhausting!
Amen, amen! That was a good point; that was a good point! What happened here? The least qualified person was qualified by grace, and in a moment, she went from being an immoral woman with a horrible reputation to an evangelist who brought an entire city to faith in Christ—the beginning stages of a builder, a builder, a builder of cities. I remember years ago, facing this as a pastor just probably two or three years into it. I remember being challenged with a thought that when I ministered to people who were born again (this is going to sound silly, maybe), but when I ministered to believers, I needed to approach them believing they were saved. What does that mean?
Translate that to mean if a person is truly born again, they are born again from the inside out. Their heart has been changed, and they have a God-given desire for the will of God! Anyone who’s truly been born again at their core—the center of their being—has a desire to serve and to please God—that’s what being born again means; it changes us from the inside out! So early in my pastoral ministry, I began to—when I’d have a couple who were having marital problems or whatever issue was going on—I would always speak to people believing in their conversion and speaking to their devotion to please God with everything they are.
When you don’t believe that—as a leader—if I don’t believe that, then what I’m going to do is treat you with control and judgment to keep you motivated to serve God! I’m going to use scare tactics! I’m going to limit your liberties and your freedoms to discover the will of God and to present Him as you are gifted and called to do—I’m going to do all kinds of things that narrow down your capacity to function according to what I think is God’s will for your life! And that control is frequently justified by people who don’t believe that in the heart of hearts, somebody wants to do the will of God.
Jesus just treated people differently! We know that! It’s easy to say, but He just did! He took 12 extremely unqualified guys and sent them out to preach the gospel! I mean, He didn’t wait until He was through after three and a half years; He didn’t wait until He put them through his discipleship training class. He just put them to work immediately, just saying, «It’s time to get to work!» I remember one of our young men prophesied at Barnes & Noble over a couple of witches, and they got saved and delivered—all in Barnes & Noble!
If you can’t have revival there, where are you going to have it? He brought deliverance to them, and it was just marvelous! They got set free from the torment and all that stuff, and he’s sitting there at the table, having coffee, ministering to these two witches—and he’s surprised! He would have surprised all of us! He said, «All right, now you give me a word!» See, a lot of Christians are afraid to get contaminated because you know how powerful the devil is. I have yet to see darkness swallow light! So he turned to these two and he said, «All right, you know I don’t know how he worded it—you’ve been saved five minutes—now prophesy to me!» And they looked at him, and they thought, «Well, this is all they know of the Christian life! This is what you do!»
They have five minutes experiencing the things of God; their life has been changed, and they’re sitting at the table; they began to prophesy to him! Here’s the deal—they began to quote scripture they had never read! Sometimes our inability to enable people to serve Him is governed by our misconception of how big He is. He said, «The broken will be beautiful, and they’ll restore cities. The mournful will be restored; they’ll rebuild cities. The tormented will be restored; they’ll rebuild cities.» Every one of them had a destiny!
And here it comes to someone out of time, unqualified on many levels—someone not ready for a commission! They needed some training. And Jesus brought her a word that set her free from the inside out! She believed, and she brought a city into faith in Christ. I’m looking for every new believer in this room to take baby steps. I told you a couple of months ago: my wife and I have been trying to get her to drink coffee for 41 years. She has resisted me completely. She is a godly woman, but she just has this one problem.
And about two months ago, she discovered she liked this certain kind of decaf coffee, and I figured baby steps! I want every new believer in the family to realize you have permission to take steps, step, step, and sit down! Step, step, and sit down! Because what we celebrate are the steps! We celebrate! Why? Because you are marching towards the privileged position of rebuilding cities! And I want everyone else in the room to be the mom and dad that say, «All right, two more steps! You took five today? That’s awesome!» Right?!
Grandma took five steps! Be the person that says, «Come on! You can do more! You can do more!» Because we don’t have time to play games to see who’s qualified! We are in a season—a very measured time—and it’s important that we empower, we stay loyal, and we value this tree of righteousness, this holy lifestyle. But in that process, we just give people permission: let’s change the world as long as we’re here! All right, I just understand!
Eric’s going to be ministering tonight! It’s going to be good; it always is good! Do you realize what would happen in this city? Now we’ve got good churches all over this town. I feel like we’re some of the richest people on the planet because you almost can’t make a mistake about where you choose to go! There are just great pastors, great leaders, great people with a heart for God all over our city, all over this region! But if this were the only church—and it isn’t—if it was… do you realize what would happen in five years if all you did was reproduce yourself once a year? It’s not about just how many people attend church in a city that tells me it’s built. The rebuilders will rebuild a different standard.
They’ve discovered through God’s restorative process what it takes to heal the culture of a city until that culture mirrors the values and the atmosphere of heaven, and I believe God’s raising that up. I believe God’s giving us an opportunity to cheer each other on as we involve ourselves in seeing a city completely healed. So, Father, that’s the cry! I pray for that! I pray for that in honor of the name Jesus—that there would actually be peace on earth and good will towards men! That would happen—in our lifetime—where you’ve given us a place to set down roots and have long-lasting influence!
I pray for that. I pray as well for every new believer, every person who has never felt they had the chance to take three steps and sit down, never had the chance to really learn how to do this walk thing, God—that you would bring healing to those who got stung with ignorant accusations over what caused them to sit out! God, we just celebrate progress, and I pray for every person in this room to be engulfed in the privilege of transformation. I pray for this in Jesus' name! Amen! Amen!