Bill Johnson - God Wants to Speak to You Through Your Dreams
Thank you, beautiful. I love the Christmas season; it’s a great season for most, but it’s a troubling season for many. We’ll talk about that a little bit today, but I feel like we’re to pray together for something. I sense a strong leaning from the Lord towards reconciliation; He’s always ready to reconcile, but there’s something special about family reconciliation and relational reconciliation right now that I feel is significant. In the last 20-plus years—almost 21 years now—I don’t know how many times we’ve called for family reconciliation, but whenever we have, it’s always been at a time when He highlights it, and there are always miracles. Every single time, there are unusual miracles of people just getting restored. Eric was sharing this morning in our staff prayer gathering early on Sunday, and he shared two stories with a little bit of detail about two folks from our church family. One had a girl pregnant during high school and hadn’t had any relationship with that child since then; that child is now 35 years old, and they’ve reconnected. They’re going to be together for Christmas, which is miraculous. The other is similar—a 15-year-old child. To me, these were indicators of what the Lord is doing; He’s healing things and reconciling the most impossible situations. It is just so fun to be part of that. We get to pray into that today.
I know there are folks here—Paul prayed for marriages during our prayer time today—and I feel like God is focused on this relational thing. Maybe you have a child that you haven’t seen; maybe they disappeared off the map several months or even years ago. We’re going to pray that the Lord would restore that. I believe the Lord is going to release an angelic presence to guide that child or whatever the situation might be, helping to direct, bring healing, restoration, and bring the person home. If you have reconciliation needs in your immediate family, it could be something I wouldn’t even think of, but it’s dear to you, so I want you to stand because we’re going to pray together. If that’s you and you have family matters, stand up because we’ll have people join with you. I believe this is a miracle day; it’s a miracle moment. Look at all these people; this is our family. My goodness, my heart just bleeds for the situations represented here. It goes out to person after person, but we don’t pray just to express sympathy; we pray because we believe the God who works miracles can intervene in even the worst situations.
My goodness, we could spend all day just talking about the worst imaginable situations we’ve seen Him heal already, and He is not limited in how He works. The cool thing is I’ve noticed He tends to do it in ways we don’t expect, so that’s always fun too—He sneaks up on us. Some people call Him «Jehovah Sneaky»; He sneaks into a situation and brings healing in the most unusual way. So, we’re going to believe for that. How many of you believe God heals and brings restoration to relationships? I’m telling you, I believe it’s the word of the Lord; this is a moment for miracle reconciliation. I want all of you—those of you watching online, join with us in this. If you’re in the room, partner together; if you’re by yourself, lay your hand on your heart or do something to partner with us because we’re going to believe God for miracles of restoration. Between now and the New Year, we want this to be several weeks of unusual reconciliations—even in areas you never even thought to pray about. So let’s go big—or go home; let’s just go big!
Put your hands up if you’re standing so people can see who you are. If you’re sitting around them, that’s your assignment—go pray for them, lay hands on them. You don’t have to find out any details; we’re just praying reconciliation. Pray and prophesy; lift your voice; declare God will restore all; you will recover all. Thank you, Lord God. Thank you, Lord. Just confess over them—you shall recover all; all will be restored to you. Everything that was stolen will be restored; every broken place will be mended. Holy Spirit, we invite you to come with such power and demonstrate Yourself strong as You restore families again. Let it be said that every broken area was healed; let it be said every fallen spouse was restored, and every broken situation with children and parents would be healed. We declare these things in Jesus' wonderful name—wonderful name!
I want all of you to make this confession with me: because of Jesus, I will recover all. I want us to say it together: because of Jesus, I will recover all. It’s just too good to say it only once; let’s say it again: because of Jesus, I will recover all. Amen? Amen.
Go ahead and be seated. Thanks to all of you who stood; thank you so much for your vulnerability in front of the family. We really are contending for breakthrough. You know, everybody knows we love stories of miracles and healing, and we just get so many. We received more this week that are just outrageous. I was in Dallas last week speaking at Gateway, which is a great church; it was fun to be there for many reasons to see what the Lord’s doing there. It was also a side benefit whenever I go anywhere; people come up who may have attended a conference here or something and share how God healed them of something unbelievable. You just never get tired of those stories. But let me let you in on a secret: I get just as excited about financial miracle stories and relational stories. I do! I get so happy about those things. We target physical issues a lot because it’s a call God has put on us, but I get so happy when I hear about families being restored and children who were lost returning home. That never gets old! You see the joy in the eyes of parents or children or spouses, and there are many situations here that need divine intervention. I believe the angel of the Lord has been released. When we prayed, something was released into your situation, and I agree; I just think they don’t have a chance.
Before I get into talking with you, I don’t have a teaching today; it’s more of a fireside chat, which I like to do sometimes. I’d like to talk about the Christmas story. However, before that, I have a funny story I read a while back that’s one of my all-time favorites. As a bagpiper, I often play at many gigs. Recently, I was asked by a funeral director to play at a graveside service for a homeless man. He had no family or friends, so the service was to be at a potter’s cemetery in the backcountry of Kentucky. As I was not familiar with the backwoods, I got lost. Being a typical man, I didn’t stop to ask for directions. I finally arrived an hour late and saw the funeral director had evidently left, and the hearse was nowhere to be seen. There were only the diggers and their crew left, eating lunch. I felt badly and apologized to the men for being late. I went to the side of the grave and looked down; the vault lid was already in place. I didn’t know what else to do, so I started to play. The workers put down their lunches and began gathering around. I played my heart and soul out for this man with no family or friends. I played like I’d never played before. As I played «Amazing Grace,» the workers began to weep. They wept; I wept; we all wept together. When I finished, I packed my bagpipes and started for my car. Though my head hung low, my heart was full. As I opened the door to my car, I heard one of the workers say, «Sweet mother of Jesus, I’ve never seen anything like that before, and I’ve been putting in septic tanks for 20 years!» That might mean I have a third-grade sense of humor, but I just think that’s so funny.
Alright, let’s get going here. I want you to go to Matthew chapter 2. Today, I want to use the Christmas theme to indicate what I believe is a season change. If it’s something that God is accelerating, I don’t know, but there’s something happening where there’s a breakthrough. When Jesus was announced to be born, the Christmas story interestingly starts with the infertility of John the Baptist’s parents, Zacharias and Elizabeth. They couldn’t have kids; the angel shows up, and Zacharias is terrified. The Bible calls him troubled. «Troubled» is a nice, mellow word for «scared to death;» it means, «I need to change my pampers,» which I’m pretty sure is in the original language. What I’ve noticed throughout the story is that you find troubled hearts and joy. The joy follows the troubled heart. In this case, Zacharias is terrified when the angel shows up to give him the message that his prayer has been heard and that his wife is going to bear a son. They were too old to have kids; God had done that at least once before with Abraham and Sarah, but these guys were too old. The angel shows up, and Zacharias does a kind of dumb thing; he asks the angel how he knows what he’s saying is true, which is just something you never want to say to Gabriel. He tends to come from the presence of God with a message, so you shouldn’t question the authenticity of that message. Anyway, he couldn’t talk for nine months, probably so he wouldn’t mess up the miracle.
So, the angel shows up, he’s terrified, and he goes from terror to joy because he hears he will have a son. Interestingly, this phrase says, «Your prayer has been heard.» Years ago, I was reading through that, and I think it’s in the William Barclay commentary on that verse. In the original language, what it’s actually saying is, «The prayer you no longer pray has been heard.» Isn’t that amazing? You can pray something, and even if you become discouraged, it’s still before the Lord, pulling on the heart of God for that situation. So good! I feel like there’s stuff we’re going to pray for this morning. I feel like God wants to release into our lives those things we may have become discouraged over. He’s such a good father; He doesn’t say, «Well, you’re discouraged, so I’m quitting.» He’s not that kind of dad; He’s not that kind of father. I feel like the Lord’s going to activate some things here for people.
So, here’s the story: He’s troubled. He hears the word of the Lord, and he ends up having a son. The angel shows up and announces to the shepherds, «I have amazing news for you; it’s good news, and it’s with great joy.» Don’t be afraid; they’re troubled, so don’t be afraid because I have a message of great joy. So, the trouble came first, then the joy. Here’s the deal: God wants to do something so good that it’s going to scare you! So expect to be troubled! Being troubled is not the enemy; it just means God reached your limit of what you have faith for, and He says, «I’m going past that. I’m going beyond that.» John the Baptist’s dad quit praying for his son. God says, «I’m going past that one. I’m going to do something that’s absolutely impossible.» I feel like this is a season when—during the Christmas season—some of you may find it a dreaded time because of so many things that have happened in the past, but I just believe that this could be the year God turns all those things around and makes this a real blessed season for all of us.
We have this cycle: being troubled, then joy. The same thing happened to Mary; the angel Gabriel shows up and announces she will have a child. She is extremely troubled. It’s fascinating; I hope to cover the whole Christmas story sometime between now and Christmas Day. One of the things we could talk about is how Mary is called «the highly favored one.» She was highly favored, yet about to be divorced by her husband because she’s pregnant. She was highly favored, had to leave Israel to hide in Egypt; she was the mother of an illegitimate son. Highly favored doesn’t always go over well with everyone; not everyone is happy with God showing favor in your life. How many of you want more favor? I should have asked you before I gave you that little list; favor is expensive! Here’s the deal; I have increasing favor on my life; I know that’s true, and I see it all the time. But I have favor because I said yes to Jesus, and sometimes saying yes to Jesus again costs me the favor that I just obtained. It’s not mine. My responsibility is to say yes to Jesus. Whether He gives favor or opposition, that’s my assignment.
Let’s just get into it. Here we have this favor thing, but there’s something else that happens here, and this is what I want to show you—a season. So, let’s go right into Matthew 2. Are you there? Just say, «Yes!» When the wise men saw the star, they rejoiced with exceedingly great joy. I wanted to highlight this because this exceedingly great joy is a word that means violent; it’s a violent word. It doesn’t mean they would beat up people; it just means it was so extreme that they stepped out of their comfort zone, and it brought destruction to the powers of Darkness that hate joy. Joy is a violent act, a violent choice that you and I make. The wise men were not just three wise guys who brought some gifts for Jesus; they were royalty. The wise men were Magi; this is royalty. What does royalty do when they come to honor another king? They don’t bring a token gift! I don’t know if you’ve thought about it; when the Queen of Sheba came to Solomon, what did she do? The gift she brought was extraordinary!
What would this team of royalty, who didn’t number three, bring to honor the King of Kings? It doesn’t say there were just three wise men; it says there were three different kinds of gifts. There could have been 20; there could have been 25; we don’t know how many there were. But there was this entourage that left from that part of the world to where Jesus was to honor Him as King of Kings. They brought gifts that royalty would bring to royalty. They went to Herod to announce that a new king had been born; he became jealous. Verse 14 says when he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt. Joseph had a dream that he was to leave town in a hurry, so he did. Verse 16 says Herod, when he saw that he was deceived by the wise men, was exceedingly angry. He sent forth and put to death all the male children who were in Bethlehem and all its districts from two years old and younger, according to the time which he had determined from the wise men.
When Moses came upon the scene, an infant was put in a basket at that time; Pharaoh got jealous and threatened because he heard God was raising up a king, so he purposed to kill all the children under a certain age. Why? Because God was bringing a Deliverer. The enemy tried to destroy Him by killing the children. When Jesus came as the Savior of the world, the devil once again inspired people to kill the children because he had something arising in that hour. In the last 40 years or so, we’ve had the slaughter of 50 million babies through abortion. Why? Because God has purposed to raise up something in this generation, and no attempt by the enemy can destroy them.
It’s interesting here that the Lord spoke to the angel, who spoke to Mary; she conceives and goes to visit her aunt, who is quite elderly. Mary could have been as young as 14 or 15 years old, and she goes to visit her aunt, Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist. When she walks into the room, the Bible says the baby John inside the womb of Elizabeth leaped for joy! Children in the womb can experience joy, which means they can experience pain. So here’s this season where the enemy works hard to prevent what God has purposed. In these two cases, it was through the killing of children. I believe this generation is going to see those who may never see death because of the Lord coming. There’s something He has purposed in the earth that has never been seen before, where entire nations become discipled in the Lord. We see it throughout Scripture, where entire nations will bow before the Lord.
I get nervous over those whose hope is in being rescued from calamity, instead of us embracing our assignment to see His kingdom come and impact the course of history. We have this incredible privilege. Here’s what I want to do. All of this is leading to one thought; as I’ve mentioned, I don’t have a message, but there’s a theme going on that I feel God wants to release—a gift or open up a gift in people today. I want you to look at Matthew 1. We’re going to skip through several verses, so just follow along in your Bible.
Verse 20 says, «When he—this is Joseph—thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream.» Go to chapter 2, verse 12. It says, «Then, being divinely warned in a dream.» Verse 13: «When they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream.» Verse 19: «When Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream.» Verse 22: «When he heard that whatever his name is was reigning over Judea instead of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. And being warned by God in a dream.» Do you remember the statement that says, «And God does nothing in the earth except that He speaks first to His prophets»? Many of you remember that, right? I don’t think this is a stretch; I really sense that this is the heart of the Lord. In the Old Testament, we have the Lord first speaking to His prophets before something is released into the earth. Before God does a new thing, the prophets speak; He speaks to the prophets throughout the Old Testament.
There was a preparation for a time when all of God’s people would be as prophets—not prophets in the sense of an office, but prophets in the sense of being able to hear, dream, and perceive what God is saying and doing. It is His heart! Moses cried out at one point, saying, «I wish that all of God’s people were prophets.» You get to Isaiah 59 and see that it was God’s intention for all of the people of God to be considered descendants of the prophets, which means as descendants, you inherit what they carry and give. The heart of the Lord for you and me is to carry this heart of a prophet.
What does it mean whenever there’s a season change? God speaks to His people. Whenever there’s a season change, He speaks to His prophets. I’d like to suggest that the Lord wants to amp up the dream realm in every person in this room. I have this sense that the Lord will start releasing prophetic dreams on a much more consistent and regular basis. You just have to do what He says—that’s the requirement. You say «yes» before you dream it. Yes! You say «yes» before He speaks; that invites His voice. Yes? Bill, that’s a very good point! I have this sense the Lord is going to increase the gift of dreams. Why? Because I believe it’s a shift in seasons. I believe the Lord is giving a block of time— I won’t get specific—but I believe it’s a number of years where there are going to be unusual breakthroughs in every single area that you can think of.
When there is a season shift, a season change, dreams will increase. I don’t think it’s a stretch to find all these verses where God spoke through dreams when there was something new happening. I believe it’s one of the ways He communicates. I feel like there’s an anointing for it today; there’s going to be an increase in our lives for prophetic dreams. I’ve had dreams that I couldn’t interpret; they were so weird. One of my favorite comedians said, «When I go to sleep, I just want to sleep, so I don’t want to dream.» But then I go to sleep and dream I have to build a go-kart with my landlord! He’s so funny.
I haven’t had a lot of prophetic dreams over the years; I’ve had several in my lifetime that stand out to me. I remember one that really bothered me. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a dream that left you feeling troubled when you woke up. You felt like you were fighting depression from it. I had this dream, and I thought, «Man, something’s wrong in my life. I must be missing something; there must be sin that I don’t know about.» At first, I just thought, «Oh God.» You start confessing things you’ve never done just to cover your bases, you know? But I had this dream—it was kind of a weird dream. I was looking at this car, somehow knowing it was from 1938. It was all oxidized, and the paint was destroyed; it had those spoke-type tire rims, and both left tires were flat. It had a California license plate. Most of you would dream that and think, «Oh, pizza from last week,» but it really troubled me. I felt like the Lord was speaking, but I thought, «Man, my car is oxidized and has flat tires. Did I do something wrong?»
I remember John Paul Jackson came, and what a treasure he was. He just died too early, and Kim Clement died here just a week and a half ago. I’m so sad about that because we needed him; we needed those prophetic giftings. This is a side note; please pray for the prophets! Don’t assume all is well; they sometimes take hits that nobody else takes, and we need these people around us. Your ability to hear from God doesn’t replace the prophet, and neither does the prophet replace your need to hear from God. So, back to my dream about my flat tires and the old California license plate. I went to John Paul, hoping he would speak a word of correction or whatever I needed. I was ready. He asked if I had family living in California in 1938, and I found out that I did—an uncle who lived there and who was a soloist for Aimee Semple McPherson.
He said the left tires represented what my family was born to do, and something wasn’t completed in my family assignment. With Aimee Semple McPherson, the anointing was supposed to spread. This old car was a symbol of something they had failed to do, and the tires were flat. But God was revealing it because He was granting access to restore that call or purpose on my family line. I almost danced out of that meeting with John Paul because I thought it was a good dream! That’s what I want to happen to you. I want you to dream things that hook you and drive you into His presence where you seek counsel. Do whatever it is to figure out what God is saying because I feel like this is a season shift, and He’s going to dramatically increase His speaking to you and me through dreams.
I’m using The Christmas Story—maybe even illegally in some ways—to illustrate that in a season, dream dreams increase. It’s interesting in this Christmas story; I hope to cover it more properly at another date. The Lord spoke to Simeon, who was a real prophetic voice, and to Anna, the great intercessor, who spent her days and nights fasting and praying at the temple. All of these elements are indicators of a season shift among people praying, crying out to God for things.
How many of you have felt a burden for something? You’ve cried out to God, not even knowing what you were praying for. You’ve just prayed until the thing lifted. You didn’t even know what it was; that just happens, because something is getting birthed. I believe there’s something being birthed in our city and in our nation.
So, today, I want to pray for the dream realm. I feel like one of the things I was supposed to do today is just pray for the release of dreams—where God would speak. I’ve had Him speak to me very simply, very profoundly. I’ve had Him come to me at night, and I knew exactly what He was telling me to do. Other times, I’ve been horribly confused, thinking, «Oh Jesus, what does this mean?» What I’ve tried to do is write them down, hoping there will be a time when He either unlocks it for me or connects me with someone who can interpret those dreams.
Does anyone want this? Does anyone want God to talk to you while you’re sleeping? Alright, stand up! All I want for Christmas is a dream! That’s right, everyone standing up—hold on, the book I wrote, «Dreaming With God,» isn’t about dreaming at night at all—it’s about imagination working together with the Lord. But in writing that book, I found stories of people who had dreams at night and the Lord showed them things they could invent. I’ll never forget a story from someone back East who fed his family from the church pantry after losing his job for a couple of years. He created something that a company in the country paid him $20 million for! That enabled him to keep food in the pantry!
I feel like some of the dreams will offer answers for relationships; He’ll show you what to do. You’ll just know what to do. I’ve had the Lord give me financial direction in my life through a dream after I had been praying about a specific thing, and He showed me exactly what to do. I just feel like He’s going to increase the dream realm, so if you’re ready, just say, «I’m ready!»
Put your hands in front of you; let me pray over you. This is kind of an act of receiving. Father, I ask that You would release now a gift in the dream realm. In the same way that You speak to Your prophets before anything new happens in the earth, I ask that You would speak to these prophets—these descendants of the prophets—through dreams, visions, and all the ways that You speak. But specifically, we say, «Lord, come in the night and teach us. Teach us about You, teach us about what You’re doing. Release the creative ideas, the secrets, the insights that we need, and most of all, the encounters. Lord, I pray for people in this room with godly heritages and those from very ungodly heritages that every family would be restored to their purpose for their household. Let my whole left tires being flat thing apply to every person in the room, that they would sense re-engagement with divine purpose for their family line. I’m asking, Lord, that between now and Christmas, everyone in this room, and those watching online as well, would see a dramatic increase in the dream realm and give us understanding and wisdom in this. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.
Now that’s cool! I’m excited about that. Alright, tonight is just going to be outrageously good. I love all the Christmas parties we have now. Yesterday was a party; I was so well-fed I can hardly wait for tonight. But there won’t be crêpes, I’m sorry to announce. I hate to tell you this, but tonight’s going to be good! Here’s something we need to do right now before we go. I know that every time we get together, there are people visiting, guests, perhaps people from our community who are here to visit, and the most important thing that could happen today is to know that everyone in this room has had the opportunity to know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior—to know what it means to be „born again.“ It’s where you change from the inside out. You don’t change yourself for God; you just surrender, and He works in you and through you. It’s amazing because you’re adopted and brought into His family.
If you’re with us today and you say, „Bill, I don’t want to leave until I know that I’m at peace with God, until I know I’ve been forgiven for everything I have ever done wrong; I want a fresh start,“ if that’s you, I want you just to put a hand up, and I just want to make eye contact with you to agree with you. Yes, right here—wonderful! Here’s another one—beautiful! Anyone else? That’s wonderful; bless the Lord. And over here’s another one—beautiful; thank you! That’s so cool! Anyone else? I’ll wait just a moment for this. There are three men I can see, which I love—when men and women get saved, but sometimes women are here first, so I’m real happy whenever men say „yes“ to Jesus because that’s a significant sign. Anyone else?
Alright, I have a team of people up over here to my right. I want to ask the three of you—if there was someone I missed, please come up quickly because I want these folks—these are friends that we trust—to come up here. They’re going to talk with you, pray with you, and it’ll be good. Just come right over here. Bless you! Bless you, bless you, bless you! Beautiful—yeah, come on up! Bless you; God bless you—this is so cool! God bless you! I love it! Wonderful!
You know, you have a kingdom mindset when you value what heaven values, and what’s happening right now is so valuable to heaven that angels are celebrating in ways we could not comprehend. It’s so extreme! And that’s what heaven values: this right here. So, we celebrate that! I want to have the ministry team come on up, and if you could hold your places for a moment, Chris, come up and give us some directions, and we’ll move on.