John Bevere - Are You Birthing an Ishmael?
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All right, so we’re already on lesson seven, talking about the wilderness. Didn’t know there was so much to discuss about the desert, did you? But I want to stay in the vein of developing a strong spirit. Let’s review the scripture again about John the Baptist: «So the child grew and became strong in spirit—not strong in soul, but strong in spirit. It was in the deserts, plural, until the day of his manifestation to Israel.» I want you to picture this: John is the son of a priest, correct? Not only is he the son of a priest, but he’s the son of the priest who went into the holy place to serve the people. The priest gets visited by the Archangel of God, Gabriel, and Gabriel—one of the most awesome angels in heaven—gets assigned to tell this dad how great the son is going to be. Right?
So picture this: his dad looks at him and says, «Yeah, the angel Gabriel came and told me about your birth.» But as John’s growing, there’s a pull going on within him. The pull is this: as a priest’s son, his inheritance is to go to school in Jerusalem and study under the greatest Bible teacher of his generation, a man named Gamaliel. All of his neighbors are priests, and therefore, they are all priests' sons and daughters. All those priests' sons are saying, «Man, we’re going to school next year to study under Gamaliel. This is so cool!» But John is feeling this tug to the desert. Now, picture this. I mean, the Holy Spirit’s moving on him: «Go to the wilderness; go to the desert.» John’s thinking, «How can I go to the desert? I’m supposed to go to school in Jerusalem and study under Gamaliel.» And you know the Holy Spirit never argues with us; He just says, «Desert.»
«Wait a minute! Wait a minute! If I go to the desert, I won’t be ordained to preach, I won’t get invited to any synagogues; nobody’s going to ask me to pastor a synagogue. I’ll be disqualified!» But God, You even announced that I was going to be a great minister of the Gospel! You announced that by birth. I mean, this is ridiculous! If I go out to the desert, I’ll be a has-been and I never was!» And God just keeps saying, «Desert.» So finally, John goes to the desert. You realize he trained for 30 years for a six-month ministry. Now, think about this. And yet Jesus said of him, «He was the greatest man ever born of woman.» So only a six-month ministry, yet he is said by the Lord Himself to be the greatest! Think about the prophets—Daniel, Samuel—but yet, Jesus says this is the greatest prophet born. You can see the conflict that occurs because the pressure is to go with the crowd, to go where everybody’s doing what everybody’s doing. No, we need to listen to God. So it’s really important that we understand that this lesson’s title is «Don’t Birth an Ishmael.»
Okay, you say, «What do you mean, don’t birth an Ishmael?» Well, I want to talk about another guy in the Old Testament, the father of our faith, Abraham. Now, when Abraham is 75 years old, God appears to him. So get the picture: God appeared to this guy, okay? And the Lord Himself says to Abraham, «I am your shield, your exceeding great reward.» Do you know what Abraham’s response was? «Big deal.» Because this is basically what he said: «I’m 75, my wife’s barren, I’m going to live 25, 30, or 50 more years. You’re my reward for that time, but I’ve got no heir. The heir of my household is Eliezer of Damascus.» So God responds to Abraham and says, «No, your servant Eliezer will not be your heir, for you will have a son of your own who will be your heir.»
Now, did God say a word about Sarah? Not a word. And for the next 14 years—excuse me, for the next 16 years—there’s nothing said about Sarah. So think about it— I said it wrong; for the next 11 years, there’s nothing said about Sarah. So he’s 75; now we go 11 years later. I mean, just think about 11 years. Okay, that’s a long time—still no child; Sarah’s been barren. Abraham’s now getting close to it; he’s thinking, «Oh my gosh!» So Sarah comes to him and says, «Look, God made you a promise; you’re going to have this son. Obviously, it’s not through me. Marry my maid, my Egyptian maid, Hagar, and I will get that son that God promised us through her.»
So we know what happens: he births Ishmael. So basically, Ishmael was Abraham’s attempt to birth what God had promised in his own strength. Now, this is so important that we understand. Paul actually talks about this in Galatians chapter four. He says, «The scripture says that Abraham had two sons: the son of a slave wife was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God’s promise, but the son of the freeborn’s wife was born as God’s own fulfillment of His promise.» These two women serve as an illustration.
So here I am in college, and when God first started dealing with me about ministry, the last thing I ever wanted to do was be a minister. I’m like, «Oh my gosh, no!» Because I had two images of a minister. I grew up in a little town of 3,000 people. One was the Catholic priest—they don’t get married; that’s completely not an option for me. The second one was this minister who pastored this really tiny church in our town, who had two kids about my age, and they were really strange, okay? Strange. I went to their house one time, and it was so disorganized and smelled so bad I had to hold my breath until I could make an excuse to get out of the house. So I had a bad image of ministry. I thought, «Either you’re going to be a priest and never get married or have a smelly house with weird kids or end up in Africa in a shack with no shoes.» So I wanted nothing to do with it. Well, God spent time dealing with me, and finally, I said, «Okay, God, I’ll go wherever You tell me to go. I don’t care if I’ve got a smelly house and weird kids; I will fulfill this call because I love You.»
So now I’m excited about it, and you know what the Lord says? One night, I’m studying thermodynamics, and I threw my thermodynamics 2 book against the wall and said, «I’m done with this! I’m called to preach! What am I doing studying mechanical engineering, which Purdue University has one of the hardest mechanical engineering curriculums of any college in the nation?» So I called my friend; I said, «Hey, I’m leaving. I’m going to Bible school.» He said, «Can we pray?» So when I prayed, God said, «I’m not a quitter. I want you to finish your college education.» So I endured the next two years, and then I went on this four-day fast. During the fast, the Lord said to me, «I want you to interview for an engineer.»
Now, I’m really upset because I’m looking at all the brochures for Bible schools, thinking, «What? You put this call on my life, and now You tell me to go be an engineer?» So I interviewed; I got 13 job offers, and I knew the one that God wanted me to go to, because I tried to interview companies in all the cities I knew the great Bible schools were in. The one that God told me to go to, I went down there out of obedience, and there was the Bible school my church was advertising. So I went to Bible school at night. Okay? So I’m working as an engineer for Rockwell International, going to Bible school at night, and after one year of Bible school at night, God said to me, «You just found out how I’m not going to raise you up.»
So what am I doing? I’m striving to try to bring to pass what God promised, right? Eventually, I get hired onto my church, and my job is to take care of all the guest speakers. We have about 450 team members if you remember, and every major known speaker is coming in. Speakers would see the call of God in my life and they’d go, «You need to just pick a city and go start a church in it.» And these were men and women I respected. I had one woman say, «You should go to the Caribbean and just start your ministry like T.L. Osborne did.» That’s where he started. He’s won 62 million people to Jesus now in Africa and Hindu mostly. He started in the Caribbean. So they’re all saying this, and I’m torn because these are people I respected, and they’re saying, «John, you have a call in your life; do something about it.» But here I am serving in my church, and I’m wrestling with this. So finally, I succumb and I started Bavir Ministries, and our slogan was «Reaching the world with His marvelous light.»
Right? So now I’m printing business cards, I’m telling guys, «Hey, I can come preach for you.» I had my business cards printed and had some tape series. You know what tapes are, right? Okay, they don’t know, but anyway, so I made up this series and had my wife and her best friend sitting in my apartment, and I’m preaching this series, and it’s so boring they fall asleep—one of them literal, her drool was coming out of the side of her mouth.
So I take these tape series and you know what? One guy actually asked me to come preach! Another guy actually gave me a hundred dollars for this Ishmael ministry! But I’m having to maneuver and kind of worm my way into all these situations, promoting myself. You see what I’m saying? And it was just flat. People got blessed, but there really wasn’t significant impact because here’s the deal: when we birth something in the flesh, it’s going to be empowered by the flesh. God will always bless His Word, and you’re going to have to provide for it by the flesh. So that’s why I’m having to be political and get all these guys to get on board to help us develop this ministry. I just kept striving and striving.
So one day, I’m sitting in service, and on the platform walks T.L. Osborne. He was like one of my heroes, and I heard I was going to work for him. I thought, «Whoa, I’m going to work for T.L. Osborne!» So now I’m really trying to make it work. Well, he lived in Tulsa, Oklahoma but had moved to Orlando. So I said to my wife, «You know what? I’m going to move to Orlando. We’re going to move to Orlando. I’m going to sell used cars because he probably won’t hire me since I work for my church. He’s just a man full of integrity.»
So here I am, trying to move to Orlando, and I remember how uncomfortable I felt. But yet I didn’t listen. So I came back and I was going to tell my pastor the next day that I was going to resign and move to Orlando. God sent three ministers to me that night by phone from three different states, guys that I knew. They said, «What does your wife feel about this, John?» I said, «Well, yeah.» And she wasn’t in agreement. She said, «I’m submitted to you, I’ll do this, but I don’t agree. I think we’re doing something wrong.» Finally, the last guy, at like early hours of the morning, one or two in the morning, he’s talking to me. He’s a pastor, and it broke, and I said, «Oh my gosh! I’m birthing an Ishmael ministry!»
So I remember the next day, I went into my pastor’s wife and said, «I was going to resign, but I realized I’m birthing an Ishmael.» I just started crying like a baby. Right? And so I left that meeting, and we played basketball as pastors like all the people on the staff. And I remember I was getting ready to go play basketball, and my phone rang, and it was T.L. Osborne. I was like, «Whoa, wait, John! We’re going to move back to Tulsa. Daisy and I want an assistant. We want you to start a church that we can set up in all these places all over the world that we’ve preached the Gospel.» I was on the phone for two hours with him. I was jumping up and down; I walked outside and said, «Man, I feel like I could hit the ceiling! I better jump up and down outside.»
And I remember I felt this check in my spirit, and I said, «God, wait a minute. You can’t do this. You told me I’d work for him!» Well, the fulfillment of that you work for him was I was serving him when he came to our church. He had told me that before I started working for the church, but I was like, «You can’t do this!» And I remember I fought that check for three days. Finally, on the third day, I slammed my foot down on the ground and said, «I’m going to work for him in Jesus' name,» and the check left. It was one of the most dangerous things I’d done as a young Christian. So they flew us up; they interviewed us for five hours. They introduced us to their entire staff. We had a place to live. We went back, but I’m continuing to pray. By the mercy of God, that check returned, and I’m like, «I don’t know what to do now.» My pastor has announced to the whole church, because I’m a very visible person, «John’s going to work for T.L. and Daisy Osborne.» I mean, they had led 62 million people to the Lord back then—an amazing man of God.
I remember that check returned, and I called up Brother Osborne and said, «Is there any way we can talk a little bit more about this?» He said, «Yeah, fly up here.» So we flew up, and we all determined that we loved each other, but it wasn’t God’s will for Lisa and me to come and work for them. So I went back, and I remember walking into my closest friend’s office; he was one of the assistant pastors at our church. I said, «I feel like I’m this big. I feel like I can walk underneath that door right now.» I said, «The whole church has been announced; I’m going to work for T.L., and now I’m not going!» For the next two weeks, I literally cried like a baby. Every time I went out to pray, I couldn’t even pray because I thought, «This is everything I’ve been looking for for four years. This is everything.»
I remember after two weeks of this, one morning I screamed at the top of my voice and said, «God, why won’t You let me work for him? Why did You have me put this on the altar?» And God spoke to me and said, «Because I wanted to see if you’re serving Me or the dream.» That’s good! And right then, the greatest peace came over me. My eyes were opened, and I thought, «I have an amazing life. I just forgot!» I had a beautiful wife; an amazing wife! I’ve got a gorgeous son. I didn’t realize what I had! I live in a beautiful apartment that’s brand new, and the pool is about 30 steps from my apartment! What? And I started enjoying life again because I no longer was striving in the flesh to birth what God promised me.
So I got so comfortable that I actually got concerned. I was like, «How come I’m not striving anymore?» You know, I was so used to striving! Six months later, God opened up the door. You know, I went through an 18-month wilderness. God opened up the door. And the door wasn’t what I thought it would be! I turned down T.L. Osborne to go all over the world in these massive crusades because a man of God came and said, «I think you’re supposed to be our youth pastor.» God confirmed it through my wife, and I was like, «That’s probably the last thing I would have thought I’d done.» Even my own pastor said to me, «John, you’ve paid your dues; you’ve done this for four and a half years. This doesn’t seem like a step up to me.» I said, «It’s God, Pastor.» He said, «I’ll bless it.» I went there, and that’s where God really, over the next two years being the youth pastor, started imparting what He’s imparted to us.
But this is the thing that’s so important that we must remember: God makes genuine promises to us. But, if we try to help God bring it to pass—now, don’t get me wrong; there are times when God says, «Go do this; go do that.» He puts it in your heart; you better do it, all right? But if we’re trying to help God bring to pass what He’s promised us, we’re birthing an Ishmael. And that’s what happened with Abraham and Sarah, and that’s what I don’t want to see happen to you. Because Ishmael rivaled Isaac the rest of their lives and to this day. And that’s why Paul writes in Galatians, «These two serve as an illustration.» What I don’t want to birth in my life is an Ishmael that’s going to fight against the promises that God’s made to me for the rest of my life. So in other words, if I get ahead of God, and you know, I knew if somebody would have taught me, they would have said, «John, you’re living with a check in your heart right now.»
What’s a check? It’s a scratching, annoying uncomfortableness that’s in here. And you’re like, «Everything seems right! I’m going to work for the man that I’ve longed to work for; he’s my hero in the faith!» But in here you’ve got this—something’s wrong! I didn’t listen to that. And the Bible says, «For as many as are led by the Spirit, they are the sons of God.» Right? For the Spirit bears witness with our heart; He talks to us there! And when you feel that uncomfortableness, you’re like, «Wait a minute, let me check up here! Maybe I’m birthing an Ishmael.» And if you fully go through with it, have fun! Because you’re going to have a rival in your life between Ishmael that you birth and the true promise that God’s made to you for the rest of your life. I hope you heard what I’m saying in this lesson because we don’t need Ishmael ministries; we need promise ministries. That’s what’s going to change our world!