Bill Johnson - Don't Let the Fear of Man Keep You From Your Calling
I’d like to suggest that the fear of man is a character trait that God gave people, but the enemy has deceived us into a mindset where we actually take into consideration other people’s perspectives before considering God’s. I have a great testimony from one of our students I heard about this week. He said that about three months ago, he was walking through Walmart late at night when he passed a crossdresser. As he got near him, a bunch of numbers ran through his head, and he thought it was rather odd. Then he saw the word «dad» and the number «12.» He turned around and said to the guy, «Hey man, this may seem a bit weird to you, but what happened with your dad when you were 12?» He instantly began crying, burying his face in my chest, mascara everywhere. After a bit, I said, «I think you need to call your dad,» to which he replied, «I don’t have his number.»
I pulled out my phone, put in «530,» and then entered the numbers I had in my head. I pressed send and handed him my phone. He reached his dad’s answering machine, quickly left a message, practically threw my phone back at me, and ran out of the store. Fast forward to last month: I was in Walmart again late at night, standing in line. There was a man, probably in his early sixties, in front of me. He seemed a bit out of it, so I said, «Hey man, you doing okay? You seem like you’ve got something on your mind.» He turned to me and said, «Yes, my son, whom I haven’t talked to in a very long time, called me a couple of months ago. He left a message, but he didn’t leave a number, and the number I called isn’t his.»
I stared at him in disbelief for a second and finally asked, «Do you still have that number?» He took out his phone and showed me my number. I said, «Sir, do you believe in God or know what prophecy is?» He said yes. I got a prophetic word that God was turning sons back to fathers. Just yesterday, I had some numbers running through my head, so I asked him for his phone. I put in «530» and the numbers, pressed send, and handed him back his phone. He got his son’s answering machine. That is so cool! That is just so cool, man! Thank you, Jesus! Let’s give Him honor for that. He loves people so much! Wow! Paula, would you share the story you told me earlier? I didn’t warn you, but you’re good. Just share what you mentioned when I came in today about the wonderful miracle that just took place. Yeah, around October, I was getting ready to have a spinal fusion in my neck—two spinal fusions, two discs replaced. I had to see a heart doctor because I have high blood pressure, and they wanted to do a stress test. I thought I was just going for an appointment, but I flunked the stress test, and they told me to come back in three days.
So, I went back, and they did another stress test with nuclear medicine, and I passed out as soon as they began to turn it on. They said, «Well, you’re going to have to have a heart catheter—my worst nightmare! I never wanted one.» So, they scheduled it, and I went in for the procedure. The doctor told me before I went in, «You have a bad blockage. I don’t think I can repair it when I go in to do the catheter, and you need a pacemaker. That’s why you passed out.» I looked at him and said, «Are you kidding me?» I cried for a little bit, and then I went home. I thought, «I’m just going to pray about this, and I’m just going to keep praying because I know God is faithful.»
So I kept coming for prayer, coming for prayer. I got the heart catheter done, and I returned to my room. The doctor said the nurse came in, and then the doctor started walking in. The nurse said, «Paula, um, the doctor couldn’t find anything wrong with your heart. So God’s really good.» A few days later, I had diabetes for about three years. Then, I got a phone call from my family doctor out of the blue. She said, «Yeah, I was looking at your blood test, and at this time, you no longer have diabetes.» Come on, thank you, Lord! Everyone with a heart issue of any kind or diabetes, stand up! You just got a testimony that proclaims He is no respecter of persons. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. You happen to be here on a good night when your need was announced. This is what Jesus does.
So I want those of you around these folks to stand next to them. Find out if it’s a heart or blood issue and pray. Jesus is in the mood to heal, as always. Thank you, Lord! Just pray with authority. We’re not guessing on this one; this is not Russian Roulette where we hope it turns out. We declare the healing word of Jesus into these bodies; heart be made whole in Jesus' name. We speak to the pancreas; we command you into health and strength in Jesus' wonderful name. High blood pressure needs to get in on that one too! If you have high blood pressure and you’re not already standing, stand up! If you see someone standing, go to them. Beautiful! Okay, wave your hand if no one’s praying for you, because I want everyone to be prayed for.
All right, way back here at the camera; I need someone back there. Excellent, thank you. Yeah, we declare that healing word. Just proclaim, would you please, and declare the will of the Lord over their bodies? We speak to the heart, we speak to the blood, we speak to the pancreas. We speak healing grace in Jesus' name. Come with authority now; command this thing to come into order. Thank you, God! Now I want all of you to confess this with me. Put your hands in front of you, and even if you stood to pray for someone else, you might as well get in on this in case you have a need in your body. Just close your eyes and confess this with me: I receive the healing. I receive the healing that Jesus bought for me. That’s it; it’s that simple. Amen, amen!
All right, hug someone, then take your place. I want to talk to you tonight about the fear of man. I think it’s one of the biggest cripplers in the body of Christ—the fear of man. The fear of man masquerades as a lot of other things; the fear of man masquerades as wisdom. The fear of man masquerades as having an understanding heart. But the fear of man is actually a replacement; it’s a counterfeit for the fear of God. I created a motto for my own life about 20 years ago, maybe 18 years ago: Fear no man, fear God only; love not your life unto death. The fear of man cripples people because they have to take into consideration the opinion of another person before they actually do what God said to do. They actually weigh the opinions of other people against the opinion of the Lord.
I believe in counsel; I believe in showing respect and value. I believe in receiving opinions from others, as long as you keep them there, and you don’t live in a place where you are constantly repositioning your heart according to what someone else thinks. You won’t find any of your heroes of faith who did not get victory over the fear of man, the fear of people, the fear of the opinions of people. Courage, courage, great courage is on the other side of dealing with the fear of man.
A number of times, I’ve made declarations, statements, confessions that I find to be very important for me. One is, if I don’t live by the praises of men, I won’t die by their criticisms. If I don’t live by the praises of men, it’s interesting because we are all people who need affirmation. Affirmation is part of the core need, the core value that we have as people, as believers. God created us with the need for affirmation. Those who separate themselves are just being foolish. Scripture says, «He who separates himself seeks his own desire.» It’s absolute self-centeredness for me to remove myself from community, to remove myself from people that could speak into my life and contribute. Danny did such a wonderful job this morning on the subject of humility, but it’s a scary thing to embrace the fear of man and call it anything other than the fear of man, because then you weigh in your heart.
I’ve watched this. Jesus talked about this. He said, «He who loves his mother and father more than me is not worthy of me,» and that comes into play sometimes when people weigh the decisions they have to make. Yet they run through their mind the opinions of family members. This is a real touchy one, and I can’t do a thorough job on it this evening, but I can create a mess, and it’s one of my favorite pastimes, so that’s what I plan to do. Jesus said, «He who loves his mother and father more than me…» I, at the same time, he’s the one who teaches about giving honor, and so it’s not being disrespectful. In fact, if your effort to deal with the fear of man is not riddled with honor, then you’ve got a counterfeit because the only way to truly deal with the fear of God instead of the fear of man is to live in absolute honor because he’s the one who says, «Honor your father and mother in the Lord, for this is right. You will live long.»
So we’ve got this challenge before us because where God wants to take us, we can’t go simply through popular opinion. Political correctness has got us in deep trouble as a nation, in my opinion. Political correctness is evidence that stupidity is contagious. Man, I just feel like saying amen to that! It’s so good. See, what happens is, if you don’t deal with a weakness in heart, a weakness in virtue, a weakness in value, what you will do is give it a virtuous name to sustain it. So much counsel in Christendom is given out of the fear of man, but it’s given a virtuous name, so it’s given permission to remain. We’re at a point in time where we need courageous people, courageous people that know how to love people, courageous people that know how to walk in community. It’s not walking independently; it’s not walking either in counsel or separate from counsel. It is the vital part of the Christian life.
God says you can’t love people more than me and be worthy of me, and you can’t love me without loving people. There’s that great conflict, that great almost contradiction, and so the Lord is bringing us into a place where the fear of man gets seriously, severely dealt with because it cripples us from getting to the realms of breakthrough that we’ve actually prayed for. A lot of believers, a lot of people are born again into Christian circles where their lives are filled with Christian activity. I like Christian activity, so once again, this is going to be one where it will be very easy for you to misunderstand me, so pray for interpretation of my tongues.
Many people are born again into Christian environments where they are kept extremely active and busy, but they never learn how to reign in life. They never learn how to deal with their thought life. They don’t know how to deal with their own emotions. How do you bring things into check? How do you live in a place where you rule over money? Money doesn’t rule over you. Debt doesn’t become your master; rather, you rule over money for the sake of people around you. These challenges in life often go neglected for the sake of giving attention to spiritual things. Nothing is more spiritual than money. I’ve told you this before, but forgive me. I’m going to repeat a lot, and then we’ll see if we can touch some new things. We have two realms: natural and supernatural. God only has one natural. Everything is his natural realm. A huge percentage of his parables were actually about money. I’m not talking about money tonight, but I’m trying to illustrate that for me, God often works in the natural before he works in the spiritual, and it’s a principle that’s in, I believe, 1 Corinthians 15, where there’s this phrase: «First the natural, then the spiritual.»
He dealt with natural lamb, then Jesus—the spiritual lamb came. Natural Israel, then the church. I don’t believe in replacement theology, so don’t fall there. But the point is there are natural illustrations that lead to spiritual breakthroughs. Water baptism is a very natural act that releases a spiritual breakthrough. Physical obedience brings spiritual release. So learning the connection—if we don’t have a value for natural in light of the supernatural implications, we’re going to miss a lot of the things God’s trying to impart to us. He’s trying to raise up a company of people that know how to reign in life. They actually rule—not rule over people. The concept of reigning in life is found in Romans chapter 5, I think it’s verse 17, where the Apostle Paul talks about what Jesus accomplished; he made it possible for us to reign in life. That was the target; that target was initially established in the Book of Proverbs, the book of wisdom. The word «proverb» comes from a word that means to reign or to rule. The purpose of wisdom is to enable us to reign in life.
How do you think we become a city set on a hill? It’s not our church gatherings. I mean, I like our gatherings, but that’s not what we’re drawing people to. We’re drawing people into a way of life, and we don’t draw them into a way of life if we don’t know that way of life. If my family is dysfunctional, I’m not going to draw dysfunctional families for help. If I’m not prospering, if I’m not managing my resources well—which include time, money, possessions, all these things—if I don’t manage them for the well-being and benefit of the people around me, if I don’t manage them well, then there’s not going to be any attractant in my life that’s going to draw someone who is broken in that area of their life. So the Lord is working to raise us up into a community of believers that actually know how to reign in life.
In Mark chapter 8, I will not turn there. I’m actually going to quote a passage, then we’ll look at a few in Matthew and then probably John. All right, I’m going to do something that’s not usually the best thing to do, and that’s bounce around for an actual Bible study. It’s better to take one description and let it interpret itself, but there’s a theme, a thread throughout scripture that I want to draw on tonight. The Apostle Paul in Ephesians—excuse me—Jesus in Mark chapter 8 said to his disciples to be careful of the leaven of Herod and the leaven of the Pharisees. The disciples thought he was talking about food, and he ended up taking them into this pretty extraordinary lesson on the value of seeing a miracle and having it shape how you see a present problem. But his initial warning to them is one that would be good for us to take note of. He says, «Take heed—beware of the leaven.» Leaven is influence. «Beware of the leaven of Herod and the leaven of the Pharisees.» Herod is the political system; it’s humanistic in nature. It doesn’t mind a belief in God, just don’t bring him into the everyday affairs of life. You’ll see that in the political system. You see it all around us; they don’t mind your heritage, your faith. Go to church on Sunday, but don’t bring him into politics, don’t bring him into school, don’t bring him into the marketplace, don’t bring him anywhere—just keep him in that little place where you meet. And that’s the political system—it’s humanistic; it’s all built around the glory of man. Man is God; that’s Herod. Then he says, «Be careful of the leaven of the Pharisees.» The Pharisee represents the religious system. The religious system uniquely has a belief in God, but he’s impersonal and powerless. He’s at the center of everything, but he actually has no voice.
The political system and the religious system, the religious spirit and the political spirit, they have one area where they overlap—the fear of man. They both are governed by the fear of man. So whether you’re dealing with religious institutions—and by the way, please, not everyone in religious institutions or political institutions is governed by that power—but you just have to be aware of that. Well, let me give you an example. You can tell what governs a person’s life by how they deal with problems. Do you remember when in John chapter 8 they brought a woman caught in adultery and put her before Jesus? What did the religious leaders have in their hands? Rocks. Stones! Why? Because it was important for the religious system to show their passion through judgment.
The answer of the religious system is, «I want to display to you my zeal for God, my zeal for his word by judging the sinner.» On the other hand, we have Pilate. Jesus, who has been accused of everything in front of him, has no reason to find him guilty, and he wants to set him free; but he is persuaded by the people who said they are going to tell Caesar—they’re going to rat on him if he doesn’t carry out their wishes. And so the fear of man enters Pilate’s heart as well. What does he do? He washes his hands of the matter, right? Wow! What is he doing? He’s making his statement by creating distance between him and the accused. The political system punishes by isolation. The religious system punishes by judgment.
Jesus was warning about the influence on the mind, influencing the value system, how we process information. It’s not just that I eventually get to the right decision; what he’s working on is getting me to react Kingdom. How many of you have areas in your life that you eventually get to the right answer; it just takes you a little journey? You throw a few things, yell at a few people, then finally repent; I come into my right mind and I’m happy. You know, that’s how so many people live. What he’s looking for is to get the renewed mind so intact that we react Kingdom. How is leaven activated? It’s yeast; it’s put into dough, it’s put into bread. But we’ve made a lot of bread, especially back in Weaverville, where the house was very cold, and we had wood heat. That was our only source of heat for 17 years, and Benny would make bread. If it wasn’t rising, she’d put it by the fire because fire activates, and the fire of pressure will reveal whatever leaven is in your thinking.
That’s why an initial problem will come up, and immediately, most of our tendency is to point the finger at someone else. Because the problem can’t be us. You know, God shows up to confront Adam, and Adam says, «It was the woman.» The woman goes, «It was the serpent.» There’s always someone else to blame. In the fire of affliction, in the fire of challenge and difficulty, we find out what’s in us. Our initial reaction is according to the leaven we’ve embraced in our life. Now, that is never to shame us; it is only to bring it into the open so that through confession and repentance we can be free of that. That just came up so good! If I see I’m reacting—I was thinking evil about this individual; I was hoping God would judge them and show them that I’m right, or some other stupid thing, and that comes up in my heart—let’s say it goes on for 15 seconds before I catch it. All right, that’s 15 seconds too long!
What happens? I go, «Oh God, please forgive me. That is wrong; that is not your heart for people.» I confess it; I repent; I bring forth fruit of my repentance. There has to be evidence. It can’t be just that I confessed; there has to be evidence. And so I will turn my prayer in favor of the person and pray for God’s touch to be on their life. We have people who have done some very, very, very nasty things towards this house, and my heart breaks for them sincerely. I don’t want God’s judgment on them; I want him to be merciful, because I know I have thought a lot of stupid things in my life, and he was merciful to me. So I pray that God would extend mercy toward those who have raised the finger of accusation. One of the things that silences that rage— that rage that accuses, that looks for evidence of wrong, looks for evidence to prove that this person is not who they claim to be or say they are— is when we turn that leaven that was so wrongly planted in our heart and turn it in a direction where we serve that person in prayer. We say, «God, just visit them with mercy; visit them with kindness. God, your kindness leads to repentance. It’s the only way I got here, as you were kind to me when I didn’t deserve it.»
I pray that for this man, for this woman. We’ve had people with protest banners and stuff when we go places, just really cursing us and me and some of my friends. I remember I was in New Zealand once; this guy had a huge, like a 4-by-8-foot piece of plywood where he was rebuking everyone that would associate with me. A few other friends were upset that his name wasn’t on the sign; it’s really funny. The point is, you turn what was meant for evil, realizing that God is able to use every card that’s rolled to bring it forth for his glory and for our honor. What I don’t want to do is receive things of that nature, and so much worse, as fuel. Fuel for the leaven of the wrong mindset in the political system and the religious system both have a lot to say on how you treat a person who violates your personal integrity, but neither of them make good counselors. Wow!
So the fear of man is a pretty big deal. We need affirmation. Most of the time when people fight for recognition, they’re actually fighting for identity, and they’re hoping to find identity through the applause of man. I think applause has a place. I think that’s what honor does. I think if we don’t know how to receive honor, we’ll have no crown to throw at his feet. It’s vital that we learn how to actually receive honor and not deflect it, not say, «Oh, it wasn’t me; it was Jesus.» Shut up! That’s—I never did like that. That’s just stupid! You just say thank you; receive the gift they’ve given you, and then get along with God and give it to whom it belongs. There’s no harm, no foul. Take what was given to you and give it to the Lord and say, «God, this was given to me in honor of you, but you and I both know I don’t deserve it. This is a gift because of the grace on my life.»
So I give you the honor, but don’t deflect it, because then you’re rejecting their opportunity to grow by giving honor. You’re robbing them of the privilege in the Kingdom of actually getting a return on an investment because you denied their investment. See, it’s not about you. That’s why you suck it up and say thank you. It’s not about how uncomfortable you feel. I hate it; I feel horribly uncomfortable. I don’t like it. Tough! They’re investing; they have a place in this Kingdom like I do. To deflect or turn away somebody’s investment, whether it’s in word or in action, makes no difference. It’s dishonorable.
No matter how uncomfortable it makes us feel, you just receive it. You say thank you and make sure you give it to the Lord because he is the one—You know, there are people who will say kind things to me, and I appreciate it, and I know they’re intentional. They say, «You really deserve this.» Well, that’s really kind, but I actually don’t. Like everyone else, I deserve hell, and everything above hell is by grace. Now, he happens to like me, and so I’m going to receive that love, that honor, that celebration, because I have said yes and I have obeyed the Lord.
But the bottom line is, why do you think the Lamb of God is on the throne for all eternity? Why is it the Lamb and not the Lion? It’s vital we remember how and why we got there; it’s all by grace. It’s all by grace.
All right, well let’s take a look at a few passages here. Go to Matthew chapter 14. Before we read this passage, I want to just address two men in the Bible that I may have addressed a year ago here: Abraham and Lot. We know that Abraham says in Romans 4 that Abraham believed God and God attributed righteousness to him because he believed God. But we also know, I think it’s in Peter, First Peter, where Peter makes this statement. He says, «And righteous Lot.» Now, Lot is his nephew. He says «Righteous Lot was oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men.»
We have two people, Abraham and Lot, both called righteous, both living at the same period of time. One affected his surroundings; the other was affected by their surroundings. The righteousness is not what affects the surroundings. That’s huge, because we have a lot of believers that are living very righteously, very profoundly devoted to Christ, etc., but they have very little effect on their community. To say you’re the salt of the earth, we don’t take the lid off the salt shaker, pour all the salt in the corner of the plate, and call it influence. That’s called church meetings; it has no influence there. It’s only influenced when it’s sprinkled evenly throughout the meal. Then it enhances and brings out flavor.
Some people have never stepped into their anointing because they’ve never been placed where they need to be in the community. Relationships are where safety and health are found in community, but the impact on humanity happens when he’s put into the community. I have yet to hear a salt groan and travail to add flavor to a meal. It doesn’t have to! It is what it is. You put it in the environment; it adds flavor. You take a kingdom person who knows how to reign in life, stick him in any environment, and they will give influence. So the Lord is targeting how you think, how we think.
One of the things that scares me the most, and I’ve got to be careful here, but one of the things that scares me the most in this election that’s coming up is that everywhere I look, I find people that don’t know how to think. I’m really serious; they don’t know how to think. They think with their wallets. No, I’ll leave it there. Almost! I almost went off the cliff, and that’s a hole I can’t even see the bottom of! But we have to recover. See, righteousness is reasonable. There’s nothing unreasonable about a healthy husband or wife and healthy children. There’s nothing unreasonable about that.
There’s nothing unreasonable about a business that contributes to society and prospers as a result. There’s nothing unreasonable about being able to sleep all night, not being tormented in the night. That’s reasonable. There’s nothing unreasonable about having no addictions. There’s nothing unreasonable about being able to say Satan has nothing in me. That’s reasonable. He’s destined you to reign in life. Why? Because there are nations that are looking for someone to follow, but they’ve got to be people that know how to think. It’s not just flying by the seat of our pants; it’s actually reasoning through cause and effect.
Entitlement is dangerous for us right now as a country. It’s dangerous; it’s killing people, and it’ll kill a generation if we’re not careful. I don’t get up and do panic stuff, but I just did! But I’m through now! It’s killing us because it comes from people that have lost the ability to reason and to think. As long as I’m at it, let me tell you what else I’m thinking. How many of you have had more than one promise that God has given you? I mean, very few of you have had more than one! All right, we are in a promise-oriented culture. I mean, promises are everywhere, and if we are to be a promise-oriented culture, the promises have to lead me to trust or they lead me to entitlement.
Wow! I can tell you how to recognize what you’re feeling and recognize where you’re at. People who are frustrated with a lack of breakthrough in their lives are different from those who are overwhelmed and impressed with what God is doing. The difference is this: When God is your servant, you will constantly be frustrated. When you are his servant, you will constantly be amazed. When we’ve reduced him to the cosmic bellhop that lives to answer our cries and prayers, we live in continual frustration because things don’t work out in our timing. Yet he is the one who invites us in as friends and says, «Whatever you desire, when you pray, believe that you have it.» Both realities are true, but they happen on his development program.
He put it this way, just to ensure we’d get it: «Seek first the kingdom, and all these things will be added.» Keep this first; the other stuff will find its place. So good!
Matthew 14, verse 3: «Herod laid hold of John, bound him, and put him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife. John had said to him, 'It’s not lawful for you to have her! '» Although he wanted to put him to death, he feared the multitude because they counted him as a prophet.
Look at chapter 21, Matthew 21, verse 45: «When the chief priests and Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking of them. But when they sought to lay hands on him, they feared the multitudes because they took him for a prophet.» All I want to do is show you a couple passages of scripture, and there are many more that deal with what was—what was the constant influence in people’s minds.
Here’s a strange thing we have to be very careful about. One of the worst things that could happen for us, whether it’s in the city of Redding or believers in our nation or nations of the world represented for us to be given political power, is that the political system works by a different spirit. You can yield to that spirit to bring about righteous decisions, but the problem is when you live by the sword, you die by the sword. The very thing that exalted you is the very thing that will take you out. The political system is a manipulative system; it controls through manipulation and influence, isolation. Nobody wants to be isolated. If you don’t make some compromises on this and that, we’re going to isolate you; we’re going to separate you.
It’s what David did to Uriah when he wanted him dead. He just had Joab and all the armies pull back from him; who is on the front lines? The political system uses manipulation. I happen to believe, in fact, the interactions that we have with political leaders in many countries of the world are more and more pressed with Godly good. Some aren’t even believers, but their thinking is more Kingdom than many believers. That’s what you want to look for. You want to look for a worldview. I don’t want a tongue-talker in office who can’t make smart decisions. I want to look for the person the anointing is on to bring to the table a worldview that is consistent with the Kingdom.
The political system works through manipulation and control, and so does the religious system because manipulation is one of the tools that the fear of man brings. If you don’t do this, if you don’t do that, I watch people who face very difficult decisions, and they rehearse in their mind what it’s going to cost them from their family, what their family members or their associates or their peers, or in my case, pastors, might think. If you knew a little bit more behind the scenes, you’d understand I really do value counsel, and I do value walking in community with people. This isn’t a reaction to stupid things that have been done; this is just being aware.
I can tell you where I’ve gone to war. I can tell you where I paid the biggest price, and the biggest price was always dealing with the fear of man. There were moments of decision in the direction of this ministry, this house, and what we were doing in the early days. When a thousand people left, there was a decision that had to be made day after day after day after day, and that was: Give no mind to the fear of man. Pay no attention to that voice; it’s an unworthy voice. Well, they deserve to be heard. Actually, they don’t. Come on, actually, they don’t.
Everybody deserves to be loved, but I’m not looking for opinions. This is not going quite where I planned here. I’m not sure I’m communicating this very well, but there’s a lot of—well, let me tell you this. The most profound encounter I had with the Lord in my life—some of you have heard the story; I won’t take you into the full story—was at 3:00 a.m. in October 1995. The Lord came in power and settled upon me, and I had such power coursing through my limbs that I had no control. I was embarrassed. I was ashamed. Yet nobody could see me. Benny was sleeping, which is a miracle because we had a waterbed, and there were tidal waves going on. That evening, I had given a prophetic word to a friend of mine and a word of exhortation that God was going to touch him, and it could be at 3:00 in the morning.
So when the power of God hit me, I could move my head; I had no control of anything else. I turned and looked at the clock right here on the side of the bed, and it was 3:00 a.m. exactly. I said out loud, «You set me up!» It was like, you know, I went in a divine moment; you have everything in mind that you need to have in mind because he puts it there; he refreshes your memory. Go, 3:00 a.m. I prophesied to my friend Tom; here it is, 3:00 a.m., and I’ve got this encounter with God. I realize this: I’ve never seen or heard anything like this. This is embarrassing. I actually felt my face turn red. I was embarrassed, and it’s really a bummer to be embarrassed by what God’s doing.
It’s one of the things that has to die. So many people mock and make fun of the clouds of gold dust or whatever, or feathers, or oil, or whatever. Yeah, when it doesn’t happen to you first, it’s embarrassing to have things going on in your life you can’t explain! So I laid there at 3:00 in the morning with this electrical power going through me, and I had no control whatsoever. I would try to get my arms back to my side. My legs would become more violent; I laid there thinking. He reminded me I had been praying for eight months nonstop, day and night. I would awake myself in the middle of the night praying, «God, I want more of you at any cost!»
Then he asked me a question: Did you mean it when you said «any cost?» Then he showed me a scene where I saw myself trying to teach in front of our church family in Weaverville, and I realized there’s no one there that’s going to believe this is God. This is embarrassing! In the next scene, I saw myself standing in front of my favorite restaurant in town in that condition, realizing there was no one in my community that was going to believe this is God either. I’m going to be an embarrassment to our church. I’m going to be an embarrassment to the community because I had no control. As far as I could tell, I was going to be like that the rest of my life if I said yes.
I didn’t know; I honestly didn’t know if I’d spend the rest of my life in bed because I blew a fuse. I had no control of my limbs. I remembered that Jacob wrestled with an angel, and he limped for the rest of his life. Mary became pregnant and was the mother of the illegitimate child all the days of her life. I realized that sometimes encounters with God aren’t that impressive for everybody around you. Sometimes they’re very offensive. I get it; I’ve watched people shake through the years. Some of them just needed attention. It wasn’t God. I’ve seen people shake by the presence of God; I’ve seen them shake by the power of the devil, and it all looked the same.
What the religious community does is just remove it off the acceptable list because that way you actually don’t ever have to deal with the devil or the breakthrough God alone can bring or the people that just need attention. After these scenes went through my mind, I laid there with tears flowing down the sides of my face onto the pillow and became aware of the fact he was looking to see if I meant it when I said I wanted more at any cost. Because he had just put in front of me what the cost would be, it came down to this: I had to be willing to give up my right to dignity. And I said yes.
I’ll take it! If I get you in the exchange, you can do anything you want to me. You can make me as undignified as you want. I don’t care if I get you; you are what I hunger for. It didn’t end; it continued throughout the night. It then started again. I don’t always tell this part of the story, but it actually went on the second and third night. The point was the Lord wanted to shake something out of me that most everybody around me who knew me would have said, «Bill doesn’t deal with the fear of man anymore,» but God peeled another layer back, and he saw what he wanted me to deal with.
The only way to the measure of courage that you and I have an ache in our heart for is to not live with the fear of man. In our pursuit of dealing with the fear of man, we must embrace the privilege to love and give honor. If we can do those at the same time, I think you’ll find what not being manipulated or controlled by the fear of man actually looks like. Sometimes the Lord puts decisions in front of us—things that have to be decisions, things to embrace, directions to go.
I remember an acquaintance of mine—I don’t know him well—but I remember a man in another part of the country where God was moving very powerfully. He had a very safe church and he made a conscious decision. He said if I embrace this, what God is doing, I’ll lose 400 people. He had a pretty good-sized church. Within a few months, by not embracing what God is doing, he lost 400 people. I have another friend who it was costing him to give place for a move of the Spirit. He had a pretty respectable church—a good church, great church, actually—and things just were offensive to him or whatever, and he shut it down. He shut down the entire thing, and he went into barrenness—absolute barrenness—absolute desert season. He was in a meeting back east.
He’s a great, great pastor, a great preacher, a wonderful man. But he had made that decision to shut down the move of God because he was fearing what the people would say. You know, pastors have this inbuilt desire to please people, and that’s not evil. In fact, I’ll try to explain this in a moment. So he shut it down; he literally just shut it down. I don’t remember if it was a year later, but it was sometime later. He had lived with just literally a barrenness. The Lord can be—actually, the presence of God can be missing for many churches, and many would never know. The programs would continue, the same songs, the same Evangelistic classes, all the same things would continue because nothing is governed by the recognition of presence.
He was in this meeting back east, and somebody was preaching and stopped in the middle of his service. He said, «There is a pastor here who shut down a move of God and is crying out for a second chance.» My friend was in the back of the room and he sprinted to the front! I mean, the guy wasn’t even through with the altar call; he just sprinted to the front of that room because he wanted to get that thing off him! He chose barrenness instead of fruitfulness. You know, cemeteries are very orderly; nurseries are not. Choose what you want! Life or order!
Well, it says do all things decently and in order. That’s right! It says do all things decently in order. You’ve got to get all things going before you can put it into order. You don’t create the order and ask God to come and fill it; you yield yourself to what God is saying and doing, then find a Holy Ghost structure for it. So here’s my thought. I think all of us, of course, have personality traits given by God, and every personality trait has a brilliance to it when it’s under the lordship of Jesus, and a corruption to it when it’s not.
Peter’s a great example; he’s talking at the wrong time. God finally interrupts one of his tirades in Luke 9, where Peter is on the Mount of Transfiguration. He says, «Jesus, we need to build three tabernacles for you, you, Moses, and Elijah.» He’s right in the middle, and it says, «And while Peter was speaking, God said, 'This is my beloved Son.'» So he would talk at the wrong time, saying the wrong things. We call it boldness. He had courage! I mean, he rebuked God himself, you know. Jesus says, «I’m going to die.» Peter M. says, «That’s really a stupid plan. I’m really not into that. I think if you pray through this, you’ll find I’m right.»
And he brings correction to the Son of God himself! You know, that’s courage and boldness, leaning toward great stupidity. But what happens is, when the Lord—see, what the Lord did is he never destroyed his passion or his boldness. He never corrected that expression; he never said, «You just talk too much.» He never did that. He would just adjust what he was focusing on. What he was feeding from, his worldview, he was trying to give him a different perspective on how life worked.
So every correction was just a reset. You know, when James and John—or the disciples are arguing as to who is the greatest, Jesus never rebuked them in their desire for greatness. He just redefined greatness. That’s what he did. He didn’t try to change the passionate, God-birth there that was having a wrong expression. Does that make sense? He didn’t try to change that; he instead—what he did is he redefined it, changed their worldview, changed their perspective on reality.
That’s what he would do. And I know—do you hear what I’m saying? He would say, «Listen, the fire that burns in you is a fire I lit in you, but you’ll have to think differently to get it to burn correctly because right now it’s just giving you permission to be stupid.» It’s true! What about a timid, cowardly person? What happens to that person when that characteristic of their life is under the lordship of Jesus? It’s called a very quiet spirit—one who is very discerning, very perceptive. Am I making sense? The same trait outside of the lordship of Jesus takes on very wrong expressions, but when it’s under the lordship of Jesus, it’s profound.
All right, what is the fear of man? I’d like to suggest to you that the fear of man is a character trait that God gave people, but the enemy has been able to deceive us into an expression where we actually take into consideration other people’s perspectives before we take into consideration God’s. What is that trait? The fear of man usually comes strong in the heart of a person that has a gift to see a problem through somebody else’s eyes. That was better than your response, but it’s all right! I’m going to go home and encourage myself in the Lord; I’ll be good. No worries! Did I catch you sleeping? Is that what happened?
The fear of man—the fear of man outside of the lordship of Jesus—that perspective of the heart manifests as fear of man, but when it’s under the lordship of Jesus, it is a God-given ability to see a problem through somebody else’s eyes. That was better, but it’s all right! It’s all right; my life doesn’t depend on it; so I’m good! I’m good! Does that make sense to you? A God-given ability to see, because what does a fear of man—that person do? They’re thinking, «Oh well, I know what my uncle’s going to say. Well, I already know! I already know what my neighbor’s going to say. This pastor downtown, if I do this, I know what he’s going to think.»
What is that person doing? They’re misusing a gift that God has given them to be able to see with intelligence the way another person thinks about an issue. That is supposed to give us an advantage in wisdom for how to communicate and work with people. It’s not supposed to put us into a position where we are manipulated and controlled by fearing what they think. Jesus is the ultimate example of someone who did not live with the fear of man. At the age of 12, he went missing. You can imagine Joseph and Mary were given one task in life. Don’t lose God! They were just given one assignment, and they lost God!
They find their way back to Jerusalem; they see Jesus in the temple talking with priests and religious leaders. I’m sure they were hoping for some sort of sympathetic response from Jesus. They come to Jesus and say, «We’ve been looking for you for days!» What he didn’t do is go, «Ah, I should have told you; I had to have a conversation.» What he did do was, «Didn’t you know I’d be about my father’s business?» Now, that’s weird! That’s weird! You’d think you would at least realize the pain, the anguish they’re in for failing in their one assignment in life. They feel better now that they found him, but they don’t know what the future holds, so they’re a bit concerned about their ability to keep track of the Son of God.
And they lay out their pain, their anguish. We’ve been in pain for days looking for you, and Jesus responds with, «Didn’t you know I’d be about my father’s business?» I don’t think it was harsh; I don’t think it was arrogant; I don’t think it was indifferent. It was just very factual. I’m here for one thing. I’m here to complete an assignment. His entire life, they wanted to make him king. So he could see in the crowd the movement! They are so wowed by the miracles; they are so impacted by food being multiplied; they’ve heard the stories—they’ve witnessed the stories themselves— they’ve heard his teaching, and they are thinking, «President! King! He’s the man!»
They’re talking in the background and they start making their move, and he just disappears. He had this ability to walk through the middle of a crowd without people recognizing him. He said he knew what was in the hearts of men. In other words, he knew the way they thought about exalting him as king was the wrong way for him to be exalted. As king, he knew their value system would make this an incorrect move; it was a shortcut to the throne. The only way he was willing to go to the throne was through his own death. He would accept no shortcuts, and that’s what the Kingdom does. The Kingdom values process over end result.
Wow! All right, that’s probably enough. Why don’t you go and stand? We’ll just crash that plane at the side of the hill. I felt—I don’t have this happen very often—but I felt about three or four days ago that I was supposed to speak tonight on this subject, and I don’t usually perceive that far out; it’s usually much more at hand. But I really felt several days ago that I was supposed to say that the fear of man actually starts out as a trait that God gave us that gets removed from the lordship of Jesus. But when it gets restored, you don’t become callous towards people. You live with wisdom where you see through their eyes. And while you may never think the way they think, you understand.
And the reason so many of us can’t have decent conversations with people who disagree with us is because we don’t understand them. Often times we don’t understand them because we have no value for them. Wow! So I just—it just this huge—the fear of God thing! We’re just shaking off the fear of man. You know, when you don’t fear man, you pay a price for it, so you have to be okay with that. You don’t get the applause; you don’t get the pat on the back. In the end, it all works out good. It’s a smooth move; it’s just not a quick move. It’s not the shortcut to your breakthrough. All of God’s processes are extremely organic; they’re worked out in the day-to-day.
I just think it’s possible for us to learn this and actually disciple a nation. When I say «us,» I don’t mean just Bethel; I mean the body of Christ. I think if we can learn this, we have huge decisions internationally; in our nation, the nations represented, huge decisions that our leaders are facing. They need someone who can resist the influence they’ve been bound by because no one likes being controlled by another. That’s what both the political and religious system does: it controls people, and we were all created to be free. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. That’s the thing everyone aches for. It’s the crazy thing that to obey Jesus is more liberating than doing what you want. The greatest freedom is in following Christ; the greatest bondage is having the freedom to do what you want.
Francis Schaeffer said, «Freedom is not the ability to do what you want; it’s the ability to do what’s right.» So how about we do this? Let’s pray for each other; grab a hand. What I want you to do is I want you to serve the person on your right and left. I want you to serve them because we have got to get breakthrough in this area; we’ve got to! Because the Lord has called us to positions in culture and society that would destroy us if we were put there without dealing with the fear of man. They would actually destroy, so God, in his mercy, has withheld promotions from people who have been unwilling or perhaps not knowing how to deal with the issue called the fear of man.
So I want you to pray; I want you to pray that the Lord would set them free from the fear of man. Set them free! Give them the tools to bring honor in every situation. Give them the tools to bring honor. Give them the tools, God, to love people, to have great compassion! If you see it in your own life, just renounce it. Confess it and renounce it; just close that door to the fear of man. You have no place in influencing how I think and see! I submit my heart to the lordship of Jesus; enable me to see through other people’s eyes, to have the wisdom, the ability to nurture and to love, and to care for people who think differently. Alert us to this. Wake us up to this virtue, to this gift, to this grace.
Now I want you just to start prophesying courage into them, because this is where the Lord’s taking us—into great courage! Into great courage! Into great courage! Courage doesn’t mean you become like someone else; courage means you become the best version of you possible. Thank you, Lord God! Now just drop the hands, put your hands in front of you, and let me pray over you.
Lord, I do pray that you’d give us a real discerning week where we just see, we see like you see. We think like you think, that we actually learn a different way to live because you gave us a crack at yours. You gave us access to yours. That there’d be an unusual perspective given to every person this week. Even those in the past we have feared, I just pray give us the grace to love them well. To love them well, but not yield, God. We want to be a people that are free, not controlled—people that are free; truly, truly free. So I pray that release now, an unusual gift for courage. An unusual gift for courage. Amen! Amen! Amen!