Bill Johnson - How the Holy Spirit Empowers You to Build God's Kingdom
The Holy Spirit in us is actually conforming us into the image of the One who was raised from the dead, ascended to the right hand of the Father, and is glorified. That glorified Christ is the image that the artist is painting in your life, so that you would be a living representative of that reality. Yeah, bless him, Jud, bless him. Good. Alright. A clean house is the sign of a broken computer; spell check has got to be my worst enemy. I tried to follow my dreams, but now I have multiple restraining orders. There are three kinds of people in this world: those who are good at math and those who aren’t. Arguing with a woman is like getting arrested; everything you say can and will be used against you. I didn’t write these; I’m just sharing the news with you. I have so many, and they’re all so edifying. When I get old, I’m going to move in with my kids, hog the computer, pay no bills, eat all the food, trash the house, and when asked to clean, pitch a fit like it’s killing me. I love this one: when I die, I want my last words to be, «I left a million dollars under the…» That’s fun!
Anyone with arthritis, stand up. There’s quite a few here with knee joint pain; some specifically have damage or missing cartilage in their knees. Stand up. If you just have ongoing knee issues, stand up. How many of you are actually in pain tonight? Put your hand up. Alright. Is there anyone here who has a parasite or fears they have a parasite? You do? Okay. A parasite can cause food intolerance; I believe Jesus will heal that tonight. So, anyone here with a parasite? I heard that earlier. Yeah? Alright, anyone want a parasite? Bad joke, bad joke. Alright, we’re going to pray for these. Also, let’s do the food allergy thing again. If you have issues with food allergies, stand up. My favorite one of these happened a while ago. On a Sunday morning, I asked people with food allergies to stand up, and a young mom stood up right over here. I found out later she stood in for her son, who was allergic to dairy and wheat and was autistic. She stood in place for him, received prayer, and then when the meeting was over, she took her son to get pizza, wheat, and dairy, and he was not only healed of the food allergy, but he was no longer autistic! Who was here? That’s amazing! Such a great story. So, we’re going to pray for those standing. Just hold on; Rebecca here was healed of food allergies. Wave your hands. Several years ago, over two years ago, almost three. Right back over there, I remember about the third row in. Yep. Boom!
The Bible says that all foods were made for us to enjoy, and that’s His will. Anything outside of that isn’t His will, so we’re able to pray with authority because we are embracing His mission. His mission is to correct things here that aren’t consistent with His design and plan, and so that’s what we’re going to do. All of you who are standing, put a hand up. All of you who are sitting, you’re born-again believers; join with us, please. Find out what’s wrong, and lay hands on the proper place for specific issues. You can put your hand down once somebody has come to you. If no one has come to you yet, wave your hand at me, and we’ll get somebody. I need somebody right here, right here. Yep, thank you. There’s still another one back here. I’ve got two to my right; I need two folks to go over about halfway back. Thank you. Find out what’s wrong; you don’t need a big story. Just give them a target. Those of you who are praying, pray the will of God. Rebuke the affliction. Speak to the disorder; command it to come into order in Jesus' name. Now those of you who are receiving prayer, you don’t need to pray; I just want you to be aware of the Holy Spirit touching your body. There is damage to the left ankle that the Lord is healing right now. I can feel it all along the side, all around that left ankle. I don’t know if it was a sprain or a break, or didn’t heal correctly. Whatever it is, if that’s you, just lay your hand on your own ankle. It should come into order even right now. We declare the healing grace of Jesus over people’s bodies right now. The healing grace of Jesus: affliction, trauma—we rebuke you in the name of the Lord Jesus.
There’s somebody here whose knees were injured in a very traumatic way. Who is that? Your knees were actually injured in a very traumatic way, is that right? Just rebuke the spirit of trauma. Those of you praying for those with dramatic injuries to the knees, rebuke the spirit of trauma. We declare, in Jesus' name, be free from that spirit of trauma. Amen. You’ve got about 15 seconds to pray. Thank you, Lord. Okay, you did good. Stay with the person, stay with them, but everyone that received prayer, look up at me. Everyone that received prayer, just look my way. Alright, the next moment is as important as the prayer, and that’s where you put faith into action. I don’t want anyone to do something stupid to try to prove you have faith. All I want you to do is test your own body through movement. If there was a tumor, see if it’s still there, that sort of thing, to see what the Lord has done. If you’re at least 80% better, then I want you to wave both hands for like 20 seconds or so. Just check yourself out real good; check yourself out. Move around; try to move in a way you couldn’t move. Wave your hands if you’ve been healed. Yeah, beautiful.
Alright, turn—I want you to turn and pray again. Would you turn and pray again? We’ll pray one more time. Thank you, Lord. Increase the breakthrough healing anointing here, God. The breakthrough for healing, increase that. You have about another minute. Thank you, Lord. Okay, go ahead. All of you that received prayer, if your knees start checking them out, if you need stairs to walk on, we’ve got stairs here. Just do something to examine yourself, and if you’ve been healed, wave your hands over your head as a testimony of what the Lord has done. Let people around you know that we give you thanks, Lord. Beautiful. Alright, hug a neck or two and be seated. Open Ephesians 1; we’re going to read several verses here as we get started. Anyone have a birthday today? Anyone have a birthday today? Come to, today. Anyone have a birthday today? Right here? Yes? Come here! Here’s the Passion Translation—the whole New Testament. Merry Christmas! Bless you; you’re welcome. The whole New Testament, Psalms, Proverbs, Song of Songs, and if you are waiting for the real leather edition, that comes in December, but it’s like four times as much. Is it your birthday today? No? Is it anybody’s birthday? Anyone else’s birthday? Is it anybody’s anniversary today? Anniversary? Anniversary today? Come here! Come here! Another anniversary over here! Alright, anniversary! Anniversary! Sheesh! Wonderful! Tom, would you go get two more and give them to them? Yeah! Happy anniversary!
Tom, go over by the TV camera; the people are right over there. Yeah, two more—two more Bibles! Beautiful! How many of you have an anniversary sometime this year? How many of you have a birthday sometime this year? Well, that qualifies you to buy one. Yeah, we’re pretty enthused with this edition. Alright, here’s what I want to do. We’ll just see how long it takes me. I’m wanting to get to two passages, one in John and one in 1 John, but I kind of want to set the stage a little bit. Let me ask you this question: what if you hadn’t had a real meal in several days? Your phone was turned off, and you just got an eviction notice because you haven’t been able to pay your rent. You’ve got all this kind of stuff going on, and then there’s a knock on your door, and a lawyer is standing there, saying, «We’ve been looking for you for several months. You have just inherited a great estate, and you have $10 million in your bank account, plus the land and other things that you’ve just inherited.» Even though you’ve not eaten a real meal yet, you’re still sitting there in your present condition. How many of you think your attitude would change just ever so slightly? Yeah, even though you’re still in the clothes you’d rather not have to wear, you walk out of that apartment to the lawyer’s office to fulfill whatever you need to do. You walk out with a different mindset.
You walk out with a different awareness of not only who you are but what you have access to. What the enemy works hard to do is to make us conscious of problems, challenges, failures, and difficulties. It’s almost like a dislocated joint. I don’t know how many of you have ever had that horrible experience, but I’ve had it with my left knee quite a few times. It’s connected; it’s alive; you have a measure of movement, but you do not have full use. What the enemy works to do is to dislodge us from our awareness of who God made us to be—not in eternity; that counts, obviously, but actually, it’s a right-now deal. It’s a right-now accomplishment that He did when Jesus confessed, «It is finished.» He actually meant it. His work is done. He accomplished everything in a moment on Calvary that sets us up to thrive in Him for all of eternity. Amen? One hundred billion years from now, you’ll still be drawing upon what Jesus accomplished on that cross. Everything that will ever be needed, from a word of encouragement to the provision that we need for homes and whatever—fill in the blanks—everything that we’ll ever need in this life, and anything and everything we’ll ever need throughout eternity, was actually purchased when Jesus shed His blood. Not only as the Redeemer—the Redeemer is one who buys something back—but He was also the Redemption price. He bought us back, but He bought us back with Himself. So he was both the Redeemer and the Redemption price, and when he did that, He actually set us up to step fully into who He is.
I like reading the stories of the saints of old. I like reading the stories of the saints of new—whatever that is—people who are alive today that have discovered things in God because I love hearing the stories. I love seeing what God actually accomplished in the lives of people. Of all the heroes of the faith that I have, and I have quite a few that I just admire so much, some who are alive today and some have gone on to be with the Lord—I don’t know that there’s ever been anyone that has fully realized what Jesus has accomplished for us. Right now, Jesus came as the King of kings, and one of the reasons He came as a King is that He had to recalibrate our understanding of what a King is. Because in our conversion, He made us to be kings and priests, but when we live with a common understanding of what a king is, we think it’s a position of prestige and power over people. When in fact, it’s an unusual supernatural divine enablement to serve people effectively and efficiently. It’s a divine grace to serve people and empower them to their destinies. That’s what kings do; that’s what this King does. And He recalibrated and redefined what it looks like to be a king because He knew in the Redemption He would be calling us to Himself as kings and priests—royal priesthood. Peter calls it a priesthood that has the privilege of representing people before God, ministering to God, and representing God to people—a royal priesthood.
The Lord is giving us insight; He’s changing our mindsets; He’s enabling us to see what He’s already accomplished so that we can live in that reality. Ignorance actually keeps us from breakthroughs—breakthroughs that are at hand, breakthroughs that are within reach. Let me give you one simple illustration: how many of you have been born again for a good part of your life? You’ve been a believer? Alright. I grew up in church. I grew up hearing wonderful stories. Testimonies are, I think, our favorites. The ones that moved us the most were when my parents would have Teen Challenge ministry come to town, and all these folks that had been delivered from drugs and prostitution would come in and share their testimonies. It was always so impacting, so impressive, and of course, we would cheer and give thanks to the Lord, but I don’t ever remember a testimony being duplicated in the moment. In other words, somebody would share a testimony of deliverance from drugs, and someone listening would suddenly be completely set free from drugs. I don’t remember ever that happening. A number of years ago, we discovered a concept in Scripture that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. A testimony carries a prophetic anointing—prophetic either foretells the future or changes the present.
So if you think of it in these terms: whenever a testimony is given, it changes the present reality. It actually makes something possible that wasn’t possible a moment earlier. The word testimony in the Old Testament comes from a word that means «do again.» So in the very nature of sharing testimony, God was committed to duplicate whatever was talked about. It was so important that He instructed Israel to keep the commandments. We know what that is; we know that’s just do what He says. Keep the statutes—that’s the values that God has, that’s the attitude of heart, the values that make it possible for us to walk in pure obedience. But then there’s a third thing: He said, keep the testimony. Keeping the testimony seems so awkward—how do you keep a testimony? To me, it means you hold it so close to you that you see all present circumstances through humanity’s history with God. This is what He is capable of doing. He’s the same yesterday, today, and forever, and He’s no respecter of persons, so that means if He did it yesterday or 500 years ago, He is the same today and is capable and desirous of doing it again. I’m not teaching on that, but I guess I just did.
I had a group of our students on the coast in the Fortuna area a number of years ago. They prayed for a little boy who had club feet. The students did, and they came running over to me to announce that he had just been healed. I went over to him. He was just a little guy, about this big, and he’s bending over touching the scabs on the top of his feet. They were on the bottom because he would drag them, but now they’re on top, and he’s touching his own scabs. His little friend comes up to him and says, «Run, Chris, run!» He takes off running in a circle, comes running back. He has the largest smile ever recorded on the face of a child as he says, «I can run! I can run!» Oh goodness, that just messes you up! So, of course, when I got home, I shared with the church family. There was a woman visiting here from Montana. She had a little girl in the nursery that was almost two years old. Her feet turned in so severely that when she ran, she would trip over her own feet. When she heard the testimony of this little boy being healed and she heard the concept that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, as soon as she realized that a testimony announced to her what God wanted to do in her own child, she said in her heart, «I’ll take that for my child.» When she got to the nursery, her little girl’s feet were already straight!
I’ll give one more story; the number of stories are crazy, but let me just share one more. I was sharing that story about the little boy and the little girl with Mahesh and Bonnie Shabda at a conference I was at with them. Our driver was from Brazil. He would drive Benny and me to the hotel from the meeting and then back to the meeting the next day. After the meeting was over, we spent a little time with Mahesh and Bonnie. They have a little home there where we had something to eat together. When we got back into the car, he said, «Bill, I just got a phone call from my—I think it was his sister-in-law. She has a little girl, a beautiful young lady about 10 or 11 years old, as I recall, but her feet are deformed—beautiful young girl, but people just stare at her feet. She was watching the service tonight online, and she heard the concept of the testimony of Jesus being the spirit of prophecy. She heard the children being healed from club feet and turned-in feet. So here she is watching on her computer. She calls out to her daughter, who’s in the back of the house, calls her name. The little girl comes into the hallway so she can see her mother. She says, „Yes Mommy?“ The mother says, „Take off your shoes.“ So she takes off her shoes. The mother says, „Come here.“ As she walked towards her mother, her feet were completely healed! Those stories go on and on and on, but it’s enough to illustrate my point.
The point is we’ve heard testimonies for our entire lives, never seeing somebody healed or delivered as a result of the testimony. But when you discover, „Oh, that’s how God works,“ that shifting in value, that shifting in awareness of God’s heart and His plan—you suddenly realize that when a testimony is given, that’s His currency being released into our economy. That’s His currency; He’s releasing resource that anyone in the room can take at any time. We’ve experimented with this for a number of years, and whenever we share the concept, and people become aware of what’s available, then they move out of ignorance into faith in God’s plan, and then miracles are released. I’m hoping for the same tonight in a different subject, and it has to do with identity.
I’m not talking tonight so much about, you know, let’s deal with the guilt and the shame, and all that stuff—that’s a no-brainer. That’s stuff we have to deal with. The way the Lord describes us, the way the Scripture describes us, is so far beyond anything we’ve ever seen or heard that we’ll never be able to comprehend what He’s saying. Let me rephrase it—you can’t wrap your head around it, but you can wrap your heart around it. You can receive here what He says when it’s beyond your grasp here. And it’s important that we do that. It’s important that when we hear what He has said that from our heart of hearts, we say Amen. We sang tonight a number of times, amen, amen. It’s coming into agreement with God.
So we’re going to read, oh, I don’t know, maybe just this one, then we’ll get to the Gospel of John. Let’s see how this works here. Alright, Paul, verse one of chapter one of Ephesians. Are you still there? Did you get tired and close your Bibles? Yeah? Alright. Excuse me, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, to the saints who are in Ephesus and faithful in Christ. I have in my Bible, I’ve written down those are two addresses—in Ephesus and in Christ. Where is Jesus? It’s not a trick question. Where is He sitting down? Where? At the right hand of the Father, and you are in Christ at the right hand of the Father. Paul describes us as being seated in heavenly places in Christ. Verse three is the one I want: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.
Okay, I want you to look at it: Ephesians 1:3—Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. You know, I’d like to be able to give you an assignment: find the things that hurt your brain. Find the concepts, the truths, the promises that are so large that we honestly read over them with very little consideration. I don’t know if you realize what we just read, but it says every spiritual blessing that would ever be needed throughout all of eternity has already been purchased and put in your account, and it’s in Christ. It’s already been given to you. What the life of faith is, is the life of learning how to make withdrawals on what’s in our account. It’s true; it’s all in our account, but it’s not all in our possession. Why don’t you look at 1 Corinthians 2, actually 1 Corinthians 3?
How many of you have heard the phrase Kingdom now, but not yet? I love that; I love that phrase. It helped me, you know, 30 years ago when I was starting to learn about this that we teach and practice. But the frustration of that phrase for me right now—Kingdom now, but not yet—not yet is now emphasized to tell me what I can’t have. I want to encourage you: don’t let the not yet be the hiding place of unbelief! Amen? Bill, that was a good point! Amen! Don’t hide there and become satisfied. There’s a very fine line between eternity and time. You might be amazed at what you can taste of now.
1 Corinthians 3:21, therefore let no one boast in men, for all things are yours. Say this with me: all things are mine. Say it again: all things are mine. What I’m not trying to do is heighten an awareness of personal significance that ends up in arrogance and independence. What I’m trying to do is, when the elder child in a home in Jewish culture was given a double portion of the inheritance over the rest of the children, it wasn’t because they were preferred; it was because they were responsible. With the double portion, they were now positioned to take care of the rest of the family. When the Lord reveals to you what’s in your account, it’s only to increase awareness of responsibility. Because to whom much is given, much is required. The Lord wants to increase our awareness of what is in our account, but He doesn’t want to take us beyond what we’re willing to obey. Are you alive? Are you breathing? Is there actually oxygen passing into those lungs? Everything’s good? Alright, sorry for the offensive question; I was just wondering.
Therefore, let no one boast in men, for all things are yours—whether Paul or Apollos—those are the gifts of Christ—or the world. There’s a minor inheritance; the world is yours. Life and death—that’s realities—they belong to you. Things present; things to come—they’re all yours. How can you own now what is not yet? I don’t have an answer; it’s just in the book. I’m just saying in the same way that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, opened people up to link into God’s resource economy, that miracles took place at the mention of a story, in the same way, we’ve just been given insight as to what God has put into our account. He didn’t mention it to entertain us; He didn’t mention it just to somehow make us more wowed by, you know, Kingdom theology.
Why would God give everything to His children? Because He’s not a foolish Father. We see in present-day where very wealthy people will leave large amounts of money to their children, and it just messes up their lives. They lose it all; they spend it carelessly; within no time at all, lottery winners are famous for this—getting a large amount of money, and within three years, it’s gone. So God’s not a foolish Father who gives us more than we can handle. So what does He do? He announces to us, „The entire thing is yours. Here’s what I’m going to allow you to work with; what you work with will give you access to the more.“ Why would He give us everything? It’s because of the size of our assignment—because He’s not wasteful. We have to come to the conclusion that everything will be needed to complete our assignment. Whether Paul or Apollos, Cephas, or the world, or life or death or things present or things to come—they’re all yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.
Now let’s go to my passage that I wanted. These were just warm-ups. John chapter 7, verse 37: „On the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, 'If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.'“ Okay, stop right there. This is a really strange picture because here the Lord says, „Come to Me, anyone who’s thirsty; come to Me and drink.“ And out of his innermost being will come rivers. A drink becomes a river—a drink receiving of Him creates a river. When light touches you, you become light—not the origin of light; Jesus is the origin of light. He said, „You’re the light of the world.“ When light touches you, it changes your capacity to function; it changes not only the resource that you have access to, but it changes your very nature—from a child of darkness to now you’re a child of light. Why? Because light touched you. You took a drink of living water, and you now have a river flowing from you. It changes our capacity. Everything—all experiences in God—rewrite our DNA; they change our capacity to function. That’s why no experience is to be taken lightly; whether it’s the quiet moments at the end of worship or just that moment when maybe someone’s sharing a concept about an offering and you get this thought—this inspired thought—from the Lord. Treasure those moments because He’s talking, and He’s depositing things in us.
Every time He talks, He deposits; He takes from His account and puts into ours. So, here we have this passage: He says, „Come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.“ But this He spoke concerning the Spirit. Out of your heart will flow rivers, but this He spoke concerning the Spirit whom those believing in Him would receive. So He’s talking about in the future, from this present moment. John 14, Jesus spoke to His own disciples, and He said, „The Spirit who is with you will be in you.“ So you understand the Holy Spirit was present, but He was not resident in them. He was not a river in them yet; He was present because He was upon Jesus. Right? This He spoke concerning the Spirit whom those believing in Him would receive, for the Holy Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified. Wow, this is a very important verse—a very important concept here.
I don’t know about you, but I know in reading the Gospels, especially in younger years, I would look at the disciples and how often they messed it up—how often they got it wrong—and I would think, „Boy, they surely could have used the Holy Spirit living in them,“ because they wouldn’t have blown it nearly as often. It doesn’t prevent them from missing it, but you know, when you have the Spirit of God living in you, there’s just that internal witness of right and wrong, of direction. They just didn’t have that. They didn’t have access to the baptism in the Holy Spirit. I thought a number of times, „Man, they just really could have used that; it’s too bad they didn’t get it till after Jesus left.“ Picture this now: Jesus says, „He spoke concerning the Spirit whom those believing in Him would receive, for the Holy Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified.“ Right now, we’ve got to emphasize something here.
Let’s say that I’m an artist; let’s say that I am an artist, and I am making a sculpture of this water bottle. Let’s do painting since painting would be a little more challenging for me. So I’ve got this bottle here, and I’m picking the right color of green, and I’m constantly checking what I have here with that, making sure I’ve got the label right, the right colors—there’s blue, there’s some kind of a pinkish-red there. So I’ve got all my colors laid out, and I begin to paint this water bottle because I want to get it exact. The Holy Spirit’s primary job is to make us like Jesus. He directs us; He leads us; He empowers us; He does all of that. But really, the bottom line of all of it is to make us like Jesus.
And this Scripture says the Holy Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified. Here’s the deal: the Holy Spirit wasn’t given before Jesus was glorified because then the Holy Spirit would have had to make us like the Jesus headed to the cross, and not the Jesus resurrected, ascended, and glorified. When Jesus said, „It is to your advantage that I go,“ He actually meant that this is to your advantage, God, because if I send Him to you now, His work will be to conform you like Me on My way to the cross, and that’s not who you are. In 1 John 4:17, in fact, Tom quoted this tonight earlier: 1 John 4:17 says, „Love has been perfected among us in this, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment.“ That’s a statement right there. And here’s the last part of the verse: „Because as He is, so are we in this world.“ As He is—now think about this—this was written by John. John is the guy sitting next to Jesus at the Last Supper. He’s got his head on Jesus' chest; he was there for the crucifixion.
He saw Him in His moments of great triumph and victory—the miracles, the walking on water. He has seen Him when the food has been multiplied. He’s experienced all of these things, and then we go to Revelation chapter 1 where he sees Jesus again, but this time he sees Jesus completely different than he remembered Him last. See, he remembered Him last at the Last Supper; he remembered Him last hanging on that cross; he remembered Him last in those very brutal, brutal situations. And yet when he writes of Jesus the next time he sees Him, or in the revelation of His glorified body, he says this of Him: „I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day. I heard a voice behind me, a loud voice as of a trumpet.“ Interesting that trumpets are often associated with voices in the Scripture. „I heard a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet, but it was talking, saying, 'I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last. What you see, write in a book and send it to the seven churches or in Asia—Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea.
Then I turned to see the voice.“ Don’t skip over this stuff: I turned to see a voice. Jesus is the Word of God; this is Jesus' imprint. Don’t tell me you love Jesus and you don’t love Jesus in print. „I turned to see the voice that spoke with me, and having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands. In the midst of the seven lampstands, one like the Son of Man, clothed with a garment down to the feet, girded about the chest with a golden band. His head and His hair were white like wool, white as snow; His eyes like a flame of fire; His feet were like fine brass as if refined in a furnace; and His voice is the sound of many waters. He had in His right hand seven stars; out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in strength.“ John, who saw that, wrote, „As He is, so are we in this world.“ You might say, „I’m just trying to believe God for rent for next month; I’ve got this ingrown toenail that I wish God would heal.“
You know, we’ve got this stuff going on, and here—what is He doing? He’s talking; He’s talking otherworldly in a way that’s not about eternity; it’s about now! Do you know the Scripture says that His people will be a praise in the earth? Jesus Himself said, „Let your light shine before men in such a way that they see your good works and glorify your Father who is in Heaven.“ Imagine the daily lifestyle of every person in this room causing others to turn their attention toward God and giving Him thanks! They’re not even born again yet, but they engage in worship because they’ve seen how you do life. That people would come to discover—Eric mentioned one of my favorite verses this morning—how people held them in high esteem, but none would dare join them carelessly.
I’m not talking about, you know, becoming people that somehow people worship or glorify or not talking about that. I’m just talking about living in such a way that people’s hearts are directed to the Father. They see you, and they think, „Oh, this is amazing! I can’t miss out on this! I know that if He did it for that guy or for that girl, He would do that for me.“ It’s changing our awareness of who we are and what God has resourced us with. It’s shifting consciousness from all the things that haven’t worked, that we’ve tried so hard on, and we shift our awareness to the fact that the Holy Spirit in us is actually conforming us into the image of this One who was raised from the dead, ascended to the right hand of the Father, and is glorified. That glorified Christ is the image that the artist is painting in your life, that you would be a right-now living representative of that reality.
That’s the purpose and plan of God. Whenever we worry and become anxious, we’re being drawn into a faith in the inferior. The enemy is trying to lessen our awareness of significance. Again, I’m not talking about self-worship or any of that nonsense. I’m just talking about, you know, you get the knock on the door from that lawyer, and you find out you now own this great estate and you have $10 million in the bank. Even though you have not yet eaten a meal from your newly discovered resources, you walk out of that apartment with a different attitude. You’re conscious of something you had no awareness of moments earlier, and yet it’s been in that account for you for months. They’ve been looking and looking and looking for you. You’ve had their resources all this time, but lived completely unaware of it.
When you live aware of the significance of the moment you’re in, the significance of the investment of God putting the Holy Spirit in you, what did Jesus say? You can blaspheme the Father; you can blaspheme the Son, but don’t blaspheme the Holy Spirit. What is He doing? He’s describing to us the tenderness, the fragile nature—I’m probably not saying any of that right, but you get the point—of the Holy Spirit, and that’s the one God trusts us with. He’s so confident in His work in us that He put the Holy Spirit in us! You can tell how much somebody trusts you by what they entrust to you. And so when the Holy Spirit is given to us to make us into the image of this One who is glorified at the right hand of the Father, there is a purpose in the assignment, and it’s more than singing songs on a Sunday night. It’s more than going to work tomorrow and just making a wage and paying your rent and eating—it’s more than that. It’s the effect that your awareness of His assignment over you has on how you carry yourself.
Again, it’s not self-serving; it’s not trying to attract people to somehow worship or glorify, or do that nonsense. I don’t like that at all. But it does say, „Arise and shine!“ Get up! In other words, stop sitting there waiting for something else to happen. You don’t need five more prophetic words to act on what God’s already said! Get up, shine! He didn’t say arise and reflect; He said shine because light is within you. Well, I don’t know what that means. Well then, figure it out! Figure it out! Don’t sit there ignorant when He’s given us a resource manual that instructs us on how to do life. I can tell you number one: righteous acts of the saints is the righteous clothing, and it is the radiance of God Himself that shines into the lives of humanity.
So it’s shifting from a self-serving lifestyle into a servanthood lifestyle where we live aware we have all the resources needed to be effective in our serving of humanity, of people around us. God’s the One who takes the simple act of cash that you give to the guy outside of Safeway who hasn’t eaten. He takes that act; He takes the visit that you do to your neighbor who’s been sick. He takes those simple acts—the phone call of a friend that you haven’t seen for years, and they keep coming to mind, and you just step out of what’s convenient and you make that call. A friendship—we oftentimes think in terms of having unlimited financial resources in our possession so that we can do great things for God when He’s the One who breathes on the simple things that we’re capable of doing and makes them supernaturally effective. Fear, anxiety, and busyness deaden our awareness of who He says we are.
I’m not opposed at all to a busy lifestyle—I live one—but what I don’t like is when I feel things robbing me of my peace. In fact, let me put it in two different ways. I’m going to call this two sides of the same coin: the peace, but also it’s my adoration for Him. My adoration—my times of really not saying a whole lot in prayer, but being in those moments engaged in deep adoration of Him—that’s the strength of my prayer life. That is the anchor. I believe in prayer; I believe in contending; I believe in all the stuff, and I do it, and I love to spend the time. But you know the adoration, it’s the affection for Him that does more to change my awareness of His presence, of His purpose, and of who He’s made me to be. Everything shifts in that tender place of adoration. It’s that deep place of affection for Him. And whenever I seem to lose my peace, it’s because I’ve lost my adoration. I’m no longer aware—what happens in fear? We see a problem, and we become anxious.
You can’t adore two gods at the same time. Only one can be in the position to affect how I think, what I value, how I reason, how I anticipate, my awareness of purpose—all those things are defined by where my affection is anchored. In those moments where I lose my peace, I have to find out where I left it. For me, I’ll stop and think, „Man, I feel so anxious. What happened to my peace? Where did I leave it?“ Because I left it somewhere—it is mine; it’s my possession. It’s like my phone; I can lay it down if I want to. I said, „Where did I leave it? Where is that piece of mine?“ Oh, I remember it was when I got that phone call. Instead of moving into trust, I moved into fear, and when I did, I received fear and exchanged it for my peace.
So you don’t go and just pick it up; you actually repent your way back to finding it. „God, I actually feared something above you. I wasn’t aware of it; I just got stupid. Forgive me for becoming anxious—actually exalting a problem over my awareness of your promise.“ And in those moments, you become re-engaged with peace—the atmosphere of Heaven itself! In those moments, the affection of your heart becomes ignited for the One whom you will never be able to exhaust—the resource of adoration in your soul. Because every time you turn your heart towards Him, He just moves ever so slightly, and you see something brand new about Him, and you’re locked into that place of adoration again.
I’ve heard people say—I heard one Bible teacher I have great respect for say in the Book of Revelation it talks about the beasts, or the angels that are around the throne that say, „Holy, holy, holy,“ 24/7. They never leave that place. This Bible teacher said, „Nobody makes them stay.“ It’s just the Eternal One—all He has to do is just turn ever so slightly, and they see a whole new wave of „Holy, holy, holy!“ And it’s an eternal increasing glimpse into who He is and a whole new round of „Holy, holy, holy!“ There is more possible in our lifetime than we’ve ever imagined, and we’ll never be able to equal God’s purpose and plan with our imagination. He doesn’t expect us to, but He does expect us to lean in the right direction. He does expect us to anticipate and lean into what He says about us.
What does He say about you? He says as He is, so are you in this world. That’s what He says. He says it’s all yours! The world today, tomorrow—life, death—it’s all in your account! That story I told you about the lawyer knocking on your door, telling you about your inheritance, the estate, the money in the bank—that’s what just happened tonight. I’m the lawyer! Why don’t you stand up? Out of His heart will flow rivers of living water. This He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive, for the Holy Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified. But now He’s glorified, and the Holy Spirit lives inside you, inside me, for this purpose: that the glorified, resurrected Christ would be discovered, realized, and witnessed all through the earth. That’s who you are. Alright, you ready? Very confident response filled with faith.
We’re going to pray for each other in just a moment. The best thing that could happen right now is that if anyone in the room has no personal relationship with Jesus—you don’t know what it is to be born again—you’ve never asked Him to forgive you, believed in Him to forgive you of all sin, make you different from the inside, adopt you, bring you into His family—it’s never happened to you, but yet you found yourself here with us tonight. The greatest thing in the world would be for you to realize why God brought you here and to say, „I really, really, really want to give my life entirely to Jesus.“ If that’s you, I just want you to put a hand up right where you are. Just put a hand up real high, and I’ll just make agreement with you that Jesus would fill your life with His peace, His forgiveness, His order. Church, let me tell you, in these moments, we’re hitting this week after week after week. As soon as you see that anyone of us is going to talk to bring people into the kingdom—start praying! Start praying because it is the heart of God that everybody in this room know what it is to know Jesus.
We had one of our teams down in San Francisco some time ago. One of our little 14-year-old girls was witnessing on the streets, and there was an elderly man literally sitting on the curb of a street corner. She sat down next to him, shared the love of God with him, and he received Jesus right there, right on the corner in San Francisco. He was so overjoyed and so thrilled with this that God had done for him. She went on to other parts of that city, and she heard an ambulance there. She ran to see what had happened, and that man that she had just led to Christ had just passed away. Sounds like something you’d put into a book, but it actually happened. And he’s in eternity because a 14-year-old girl took a moment to share.
Is there anyone here that needs to get right with God? You just say, „Bill, I don’t want to leave till I know I’m right with God.“ Put a hand up. Okay, I’m going to assume you’re all in. Put a hand on the shoulder of somebody next to you. I want you to pray for them. Several things I want you to pray: that they would discover new ways to walk in peace, that the affection of their heart would burn for Him, that there would be a connection to the presence of God that is new. Pray that for them, and then I’ll give you another direction in a moment. Just pray those two things—fill them with peace, God! The shalom of Heaven—fill them with peace!
Now I’m going to have you pray for a big one. I want you to pray that God would give them revelation, insight, perspective on the glorified Christ. Wonderful, wonderful Jesus! Open our eyes! Just pray earnestly that the Lord would allow them to see the glorified Christ because as we see Him, we become like Him. Put your hand on your own heart. Pray the same prayer: „God, open my eyes to see!“ Open my eyes to see! I want to see, God! I want to see more than I’ve ever seen! Come to Him right now with a heart of absolute surrender. You actually have to say yes before He gives the direction. Open my eyes to see, Lord. Open my eyes to see!
Now I just pray one more thing; I want you to pray that the church—not institutions, not buildings, but the people—the church would be a praise in the earth. That something about our lives would cause people to become connected to the Father. They would see our good works but glorify the Father who’s in Heaven. Just lift your voices; pray for that right now. Just contend for that. It’s got to happen; it has to happen! Thank you, God! Thank you, God! Father, I ask that you would stir up deep, deep, deep affection in us for You. It’s only normal; it’s normal that we see You, we desire, we long for You, we adore You; we stand in awe of You. We are in awe; we’re just in absolute wonder about You. So I pray that You’d restore us in every way to normal, that throughout the day, we’d be captivated by Your wonder. We’d be captivated over and over again, restored to awe, and let our countenance reflect You as we live in awe. Let there be a city come under the influence of Your glorious presence—the glorified Christ—as we live in awe of You. I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.