Bill Johnson - Warfare Through Lordship (How Trust in God Defeats the Enemy)
Good morning! If somebody’s full of insight, are they insightful? If they’re full of beauty, are they beautiful? If they’re full of wonder, are they wonderful? If they’re full of awe, I was just wondering. So, this guy calls 911. The operator answers, «What’s your emergency?» He says, «A guy just got hit by a car; we need an ambulance.» She says, «What’s your location?» He says, «I’m on Eucalyptus Street.» She asks, «Can you spell that for me?» There’s an awkward long pause. He replies, «I’m going to drag him over to Pine Street, and I’ll call you right back. That’s me right there: dragging to Pine Street.»
I just got back from Springfield, Missouri, where there’s a tremendous move of God. So encouraged! I saw hundreds of miracles, and we witnessed a few things I’ve never seen before. We actually had someone with a cochlear implant, a deaf person whose ear opened up, and they can hear without the device— that’s a new one. In two cases of cerebral palsy, including a little three-year-old girl who was born with an esophagus that wasn’t fully formed— they performed surgery, but it didn’t completely fix things, and she would choke on food. She had to wear leg braces until she was 15 and had severe scoliosis with a very twisted spine. Anyway, she received prayer, went home, and ate the foods she normally couldn’t eat without choking. They took off the leg braces, and she’s perfectly straight and fine. She went to preschool the next day, and the teacher said, «She’s completely normal; everything is normal!»
Wow! We also had a gentleman, an older man like me, who was colorblind his entire life, and he got healed. He was sobbing because everything is so beautiful; he can see colors for the first time. I don’t know if you’ve ever watched those YouTube videos of people trying on glasses that correct color blindness— what a joy to watch! My heart leapt at that one! One more I’ll mention: a little girl who, as an infant, experienced what they called shaken baby syndrome with a fractured skull. She was really messed up and is now about eight or nine. She had difficulty learning and specifically seeing out of one eye. She couldn’t see the big letters held right in front of her; she couldn’t tell what they were.
They took her to the doctor, who said the brain and the right eye were not connected and that she would eventually be completely blind. They prayed for her, and she is now absolutely healed; she can see perfectly out of that eye! You know the scripture says, «walking, leaping, and praising God.» This little girl was completely healed in every area. It’s so fun to see Jesus do what only He can do! So, amen! We give You thanks, Lord. We give You thanks!
Take your Bibles if you would and open to James chapter 1. We’re going to read from the «scary book» today—yes, indeed! I need to read something serious, believe it or not. Look at James chapter 1; let’s read verses 2, 3, and 4. Then I’ll talk to you for a moment.
«My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.» Is there anyone else in the room that wants to be lacking nothing? That’s an extraordinary promise—one of the largest in scripture. But I want you to see this word «patience.» A friend of mine wrote a tremendous book called *Throne Life*, where he defines the word translated «patience» in these verses as independent, unyielding, defiant perseverance in the face of aggressive misfortune and, thus, a kind of courageousness. Another scholar suggests it’s not the resignation of the passive sufferer like our modern use of the word patience, as much as the fortitude of a stout-hearted soldier.
One more perspective may be helpful: the characteristic of a man who is unswerving in his deliberate purpose and loyalty to faith and piety, such that even the greatest trials and sufferings cannot deter him. This word «patience» is almost military in tone—it’s absolute resolve not to budge in the face of difficulty, not to give in or be defined by a problem, but to rise with fierce determination. Let’s read it again:
«My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.»
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. Let not that man suppose he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
«Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love him.»
Verse 18: «Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of His creatures.»
Look at Verse 18 again: «Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of His creatures.» Let me stop here for this verse for just a moment. We’ll read a couple more later, and then we’ll go back to the beginning and talk.
The One who spoke the worlds into being spoke you into life and literally declared His truth over you, causing you to be born again by the spirit of the resurrected Christ that took up residence in you. The declared word of God is what caused you to be born again; He declared His will over you and His nature over you. His word is the seed of His own nature, and He declared that seed into your soul and mine; it brings about continuous transformation in our lives according to His design, purpose, and will. This word causes us to be the first fruits of His new creation. Since Genesis 1, there hasn’t been a new creation; He’s done many glorious works, but there hasn’t been a new creation until you were born again. He said you are a new creation in Christ Jesus, created for good works. First Peter 2 says we are a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. He calls us a new creation, a new people.
Here in this passage, James is addressing the fact that you are born again by the will of God, which He demonstrated by speaking life into you. That life is the testimony that you are part of a whole new creation, a new race, a new chosen people—literally, that’s what the Bible teaches. As strange as it may sound, this Kingdom that we are part of just works differently. I should have it down by now, but I don’t. I’m constantly surprised by how different His thinking is from mine. He actually thinks that you live by dying! He didn’t make it up to challenge our thinking; He actually thinks that way. Yes, He actually thinks that by humbling ourselves, we are exalted! He believes that giving is how you receive. And here is the greatest prize of all: It says if you want to be perfect, if you want to lack nothing, then celebrate your trials. All of the stuff being dealt with in our lives is to work into us a practical expression of the lordship of Jesus. That’s always what gets challenged—even Israel coming out of the wilderness or Egypt into the promised land. As long as the bread was flowing, as long as the water was coming, as long as things were going well, they were a people that loved to worship God. They were a happy group that rejoiced. But when they got thirsty, they would complain and ask Aaron to create another god for them to lead them into the promised land.
The issue is lordship; often, celebrating Jesus as Lord is easy when things are working. But anxiety and frustration—the kinds of things that all of us experience—reduce us to our true level of faith. It’s in that moment we discover what has actually been developed in our lives. Complaining reveals entitlement. We all hate entitlement in other people. I hate when you feel entitled, so here’s this challenge. This issue is a challenge to the practical level at which we experience and live in this realm called the lordship of Jesus. He never exposes these things for punishment; He never exposes them to shame or ridicule. Instead, what He does is expose areas of weakness to create in us hunger. He exposes areas of weakness with promise, so that we would have an appetite for the more that God has purposed to do in our lives. He does this to awaken in us passion, to awaken in us a dream, to stir in us the desire for all that He’s promised.
So think about this for a moment: Count it all joy. Count—do the math. Count it joy when you face various trials. The reason that doesn’t sound reasonable is because, momentarily, we stop believing the scripture that says all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose. If I actually live with abiding faith, that truth cannot be violated by any demonic power, circumstance, or stubbornness of my own. The will of the Lord, the will of God cannot be altered by any other power because He declared it true, and it’s His covenant with you.
Imagine Jesus looking at you face-to-face, nose-to-nose, mouth-to-mouth, eye-to-eye, saying, «This is my promise to you: I will use every situation you ever face. I’ll use it for my glory and your strength.» You have that kind of covenantal promise. If, let’s give a silly example, let’s say that you knew someone—very, very, let’s just go big, a billionaire—who is the most integrous and kindest person you’ve ever met, and who is faithful to their word. After the service today, they take you aside and say, «Come to my office this Friday. I felt from the Lord today that I’m to write you a $100,000 check.» How many of you would wait till Friday to get happy? Not a chance! We’d start dancing at that moment! Why? Because we believe in the one who gave us the promise. We believe in their ability; we believe in their integrity. We believe in their intention. Not for a moment do we think that they would ever change their mind, for they have the resource and have chosen to bless us.
Here it is Sunday, and I’m rejoicing. I probably won’t sleep much tonight or tomorrow night because I’ll be rejoicing all the way until Friday, and when I get that check on Friday, I’m going to rejoice even more! The point is that the promise gives me permission to enjoy the emotional satisfaction of a fulfilled promise before it ever happens. That is what the word hope means biblically. The word «patient» today is a different word than in our culture. The word «hope» is completely different in our culture; it’s a wish. The biblical word for hope is the joyful anticipation of good—in other words, because I am certain that good is going to happen, I’m experiencing the joy of that happening right now before it ever occurs. I have permission to engage in the celebration that I will be experiencing once it’s fulfilled; I’m going to do it right now because I have hope.
So here James comes to us with insight. I’ll put this in my terms: If I truly believe that all things work together for good in my life, I can look at any trial I’m facing, and joy is the only logical response.
I’ll try over here to see if I can find some believers in the building. Bad joke, I know. Sorry, sorry, sorry! Joy is the only reasonable response to seeing a problem with God’s promise overwhelming it. I don’t know—I’m facing some stuff right now. It’s absolutely impossible—I’m facing more impossibilities than I’ve ever faced before, and they are not fixable. Yet, apparently, they are! All things, all things get worked into the recipe until everyone tasting of that meal says, «It’s perfect!»
If I believe in the integrity of scripture, if I believe in the intentionality of His promise for me as an individual, that He will work all things, then it stands to reason that I actually have legal access to joy—not having to fake it or pretend, but I actually have legal access to joy before I see the miracle. The measure of joy that I express in the journey reveals the level of lordship I’m actually experiencing.
There are three areas that I want to address just to try to make this as practical as I can: finances, relationships, and our inner world—our self-talk. I don’t talk about the devil hardly ever, and the only time I look at him is when I’m ready to pull the trigger if he’s in my way. I’ve got the crosshairs on him; that’s when I’m going to address him. But otherwise, he doesn’t fascinate me at all. However, Paul did say, «I don’t want you to be unaware of his tactics,» so I will say this: I’ve never seen a level of warfare over those three areas—especially in the inner world, the thinking and perceptions in people’s lives. I’ve never seen the level of conflict that I’ve seen in the last couple of years.
It’s a mystery to me that you could say «white,» and the person you’re talking to hears you say «black.» They could see you turn left and swear up and down that you turned right! There’s a twisting of information. This isn’t just some stranger down the street whom you don’t care that much about; sometimes it’s our closest friends. Learning how to journey through this stuff requires realizing that there’s another influence involved, something that is not human. We battle not against flesh and blood, as we know, but getting drawn into areas of difficulty and challenge and conflict is just the most challenging thing I’ve ever seen.
There has to be within the heart of a believer a desire for reconciliation that is greater than the need to be proven right. As I heard someone say recently, in the Kingdom, there must be a desire for reconciliation, a desire for connection that is stronger than our need to be proven right. This is happening in so many people’s lives and is best fought by going through this narrow little door that says, «Count it all joy.»
I don’t know how this works, but count it joy! Go through this door that seems illogical and wrong. Look at your problem God’s way. Add it all up according to His promises. Count it all joy! In other words, do the math. If you don’t come to a conclusion of joy, then you did the addition wrong. Add it up again and keep working on it until you come to the conclusion that the only logical response is joy. Somehow, that expression of authentic kingdom joy, birthed out of the promises and purposes of God, helps to dismantle the weapons that the enemy has used against us.
It’s when I try to fight—oh goodness, I’m not finding the words well today, so give me a little grace—it’s when I try to fight an argument with an argument; it’s not a mental battle, it’s a warfare thing that is so twisted, and it affects so many people. One of the most painful things in the world for me is to be wrongly accused. I’ve been accused of all kinds of absurd things; I even had another funeral a couple of weeks ago—it was awesome! Somebody sent me the clip, and apparently, I died without even knowing it! Nobody told me! I had a 19-minute-long funeral service up there, and I watched half of it. It was quite good; they said really nice things about me too! It’s amazing!
As Abraham Lincoln said, «You can’t believe everything you read on the internet.» The lordship of Jesus is what’s being fought over. Where we experience it in our lives, those are symptoms. The fight is over authentic lordship of Jesus. What happens to Israel, coming out of the wilderness or out of Egypt into the wilderness? As long as they experience the bounty of the Lord, there’s great rejoicing. But when they’re thirsty or Moses doesn’t come down off the mountain in time, they become anxious and worried. They create a golden calf to worship—another answer besides the one God promised.
What happens when we become anxious and fretful? When we become distracted because of conflict or whatever, we’re looking for solutions. Often, while we never build an altar, a golden calf to bow to, we do create other solutions that are opposite to what God has promised. Not you, as a church down the road, but we create things that offer temporary solutions that help to bring a moment of ease to a problem we face, instead of being all in trust of a loving Father.
This is an interesting portion of scripture for so many reasons: «Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.» That military-like determination—commitment and intentionality—results in absolute triumph and victory, producing patience that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
If you lack wisdom, so apparently wisdom and faith are essential parts of being able to take this journey that God has invited us into. This awkward journey to die— you can only live where you’ve died—to go through this narrow door of counting it joy when I’m facing things I don’t like or didn’t ask for or didn’t sign up for—this isn’t according to what was promised! I’ve fasted; I’ve prayed; I’ve done all these things, and still there seems to be no yielding of the circumstances. But going through the door, where I can genuinely celebrate with joy the goodness of God and His faithfulness in that moment, somehow causes the enemy to become disarmed. That which he used against me no longer works because I’ve given myself to the lordship of Jesus.
I love the concept of the tithe. One of the reasons I love it is because it says it’s to go into the storehouse; it’s not directed by us; it is a test of lordship. Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar; give to God what belongs to God—the test of lordship. He says this: «that there may be food in my house.» I’ve traveled all over the world these many years—decades—and have been to wonderful churches, struggling churches, churches in conflict, and churches in revival. I can tell you one thing for certain: I’ve never been in a church that thrived in what I would call revelatory knowledge—in other words, the words that come forth to that house, that group of people; they thrive on the fresh things that God is saying there’s never a stale sermon.
Everyone on the team exhibits such profound approaches to scripture, and there’s the impartation for transformation. I’ve never been in a church with an abundance of the word of God that wasn’t equally generous financially. Somehow, there’s a connection between the natural devotion to honor the lordship of Jesus with my resources, which somehow gets translated into a revelatory realm. I don’t know how this works; I just know it does.
I know I’ve been in churches of every brand you can think of. I’ve been in Catholic churches, Lutheran churches, and so many different kinds over the years, and I’ve loved every one of them. But I can tell you this: The most generous places, the ones who knew what lordship was over their finances, were always the ones that had a revelatory word.
In verse 19, he says, «So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God.» Has anyone else ever been mad? I’m not through! I know you all qualify for that one! Has anyone ever been mad and completely convinced they were experiencing righteous indignation, only to find out it was all you? Anybody else? Yeah, you were just being dumb—that’s all it was. Here the scripture says, «Be slow to speak and quick to hear.» Not doing that is what leads to unmanageable anger.
Hearing what another person is saying well requires genuine interest. A verse that really impacted my life in how I relate to people is Philippians 2, where he says, «Look out for the interests of others; don’t only look out for your own interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus.» So here’s this thought; looking out for other people’s interests means that part of the responsibility I have in my connection to people is to take an interest in their interests. In other words, I’m going to work hard, I’m going to work harder to listen than to communicate what I know is God’s word for the moment.
I say that to emphasize that the fight to be heard is often rooted in being impressed with one’s own opinions. The double effort to hear well is what helps us speak with wisdom when it’s time to speak.
The self-talk issue is a big deal. I have not faced as much warfare in my own life as I have in recent days in that one area—just the self-talk, where you may be self-critical or doubt that something will happen that was promised or whatever it might be. It’s just the stuff going on inside. Let me tell you what’s really good about self-talk: Every person I’ve ever argued with, that is not in the room, I won! I was brilliant! I won every argument brilliantly! I was a genius! If only the world could see how smart I was when I argued my points inside my head! You know, it’s just not healthy. It’s not healthy to be self-absorbed in opinion; it’s not complicated, but it’s hard.
It’s not complicated because Jesus is Lord, but it is hard because now I have to think what He thinks, and a lot of the time, He’s thinking differently than me. I’m the only one that can change; He will not change.
This lordship of Jesus is what’s being challenged in this hour with the people of God. I personally think—I don’t know how to describe it—it’s like if I’m under the umbrella of His lordship in that measure, I am so completely safe. But when I step outside of what is actual lordship and start doing wrong things, starts making my opinions heard more than the real heart of God in a situation—the more I fight for my own will, or my own identity, or whatever it might be—you get the picture. The more I step outside of that umbrella, the more I am subject to the elements.
The elements are a spirit that twists what you say and makes sure you’re not understood because the enemy fears our connection.
Alright, my brethren! Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces a military-like determination that will not quit in the face of any trial or test. But let that military-like determination have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
The lordship of Jesus is the most wonderful thing; we just have to surrender to enjoy it! This is a journey for every one of us—none of us have arrived. This is a journey where we learn day by day, «Oh no! Jesus is Lord! Your way, Your thoughts, Your response, Your heart, Your view, Your perspective—that’s all I want. I want to be quick to hear, slow to speak, and completely resistant to malice, wrath, anger, and conflict—those things that war against the lordship of Jesus in our connections.»
Alright, I’m done! Help us, Jesus! Let’s pray. You can stand if you’d like; I see some of you are standing, so I’ll just have the rest of you join them.
Does anybody else like vindication movies? Be honest with me now! Be honest! Vindication movies where the good guy wins, and the bad guy dies or at least is punished appropriately? I’m so impressed with how a person will charge with a knife or a gun, and now the women do it too; in a moment, they have the gun aimed at the guy who was just going to kill them! Yes! I need to slow that down because I don’t know how they just did that, where they got it. But that’s what joy does to the enemy! He cannot handle it! He cannot handle your joy, and He cannot handle your connection!
So help us to see; help us to think Your thoughts, have Your perspective, and we celebrate even now with faith for the things we’re facing that seem so impossible! We honor You—nothing is impossible for You; nothing is impossible! And we receive Your promise over these areas of our lives; be glorified through the hardest situations we face in life!
Now, I need to know if there’s anyone in the room who has never made a personal commitment to Jesus Christ. You’ve never received Him as your Lord and Savior, and you would say, «Bill, I don’t want to leave this building today until I know I have found peace with God, until I know what it is to be forgiven, until I know what it is to be included in God’s family.» If that’s you, put a hand up just real quick where you are, because I just want to make that agreement with you.
Yes! Don’t be shy! If that’s you, just right back over here. Yes, wonderful; beautiful! Amen! Anyone else real quick? Beautiful!
Tom’s going to come up and wrap this up. Here’s what I want to ask this individual and any others I may have missed: We’ve got a team of people that we know come from Charles Tipp. Please come up! I want them to talk and pray with you. I want to ensure that you experience the love of God in a way you’ve never experienced before!