John Bevere - Don't Let Your Destiny Destroy You
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If you’re going through a wilderness, you need to thank God that He cares enough about you to allow this dross to be exposed so you can remove it from your life, because that is what will ultimately destroy you. Do you want to know how gold is purified? It’s ground down in a furnace heated to a 2000-degree fire, revealing impurities you never saw before. You scrape away these impurities, and what you are left with is fine, pure gold. The trials you face as a human being are the furnace designed to remove the impurities in us, so the only thing that remains is what was placed at the core of us: God’s nature and character.
Some of you are in the furnace right now; all you see is the fire and all you feel is the heat. Each day feels like a struggle, and you want to give up. You want to hit the snooze button; you want to give up on your marriage; you want to quit your job and take the easy way out. But you weren’t created for easy; you were created for victory. What was meant to destroy you is the very thing that reveals you. That trial is the very process being developed; your character impurities are being removed from your life. Go through the process, welcoming the fire. While it may seem like a raging inferno, keep going. Always remember, on the other side of pain, on the other side of trial, is your promise.
One of the major purposes of the wilderness is to purify us. I want to read a scripture found in Second Corinthians; this is one of my favorite scriptures, and you hear me say that often because I have many favorite scriptures. Second Corinthians chapter 7, verse 1 says this: «Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves.» Notice it doesn’t say the blood of Jesus is going to cleanse you. Does the blood of Jesus cleanse us? Absolutely, one thousand percent yes, it cleanses us. But this aspect is not about justification. Justification occurs the moment you got saved; the blood of Jesus wiped out every sin. This is about sanctification, which is when what has been done on the inside of us works its way to the outside of us. «Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh,» not just the flesh, but also the spirit; those are the sneaky ones, and we’ll talk about that. «Perfecting holiness in the fear of God.» Why is holiness so important? Because without it, no man will see the Lord, and I’ll talk more about that later.
Here is what God says in Isaiah 48, verse 10: «Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver or gold; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.» Let me take you back to the mid-1980s. At that time, I got saved in 1979 and attended a church, working on the staff of a church with about 450 paid staff members. It was one of the best-known churches in America. We didn’t teach much on character development, so I was always hearing about the promises of God, developing your faith, and being victorious. I kept getting hungrier for God and kept seeing in the scripture, «Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,» and «Pursue holiness, without which no man will see the Lord.»
One day, while praying, the Holy Spirit spoke to me as clearly as you hear my voice right now. He said, «Son, I’m going to teach you to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me. I’m going to begin to purify your life and do a work of holiness in you.» Man, was I excited! I went running back to our apartment at the time, and I remember your mom was putting on makeup for the day. I said, «Babe, I’m so excited! God says He’s going to start purifying us. He’s going to teach us to deny ourselves and take up the cross; He’s going to do a work of holiness.»
So then, I told Lisa, «Man, this overeating problem I have, this excessive TV I watch—He’s going to take it out of my life. I’m just so excited!» What happened over the next three months? I ended up eating twice as much as I had been and watching twice as much TV; everything was getting worse. After three months, God said, «So you’ve been doing it your way; now I’m going to do it My way.» Oh my goodness, I had no idea what was about to happen.
At that time, with 450 paid staff members, my position was that I reported directly to the senior pastor and his wife. I was their executive personal assistant. They had a desire to put me in an even closer role, but that role I wasn’t gifted for. I kept his calendar; I remember one time I forgot to tell him about a television appointment he had missed. I tried and tried, but I just couldn’t do it. They had already hired another guy to take care of their personal needs, which was what I did, and they said, «We don’t want to lose John because we love him.» The only spot they had available in the whole ministry was as a satellite salesman. Our church was broadcasting our monthly conferences to over 3,000 churches in North America.
So, I became a satellite salesman, which meant I called about 600 churches per week, asking them if they wanted to take the satellite. Now I’m reporting to a lady who reports to a man who reports to the pastor. I’ve done nothing wrong, so to speak, I just didn’t have the gifting. Everything started going wrong; I mean, I lost attention and proximity. The next six months were very interesting. I was angry at everybody—my pastor, my wife. I was even angry and yelling at my nine-month-old son, Addison. One day, all this was getting to me, and I realized I didn’t like this behavior. I walked out to my morning prayer closet and said, «God, I’ve never behaved like this in all my life. I never behaved like this when I was growing up. Where’s all this coming from? What do I bind? What do I cast out? What demon do I have to cast out?» The Lord said, «You can’t cast out flesh; you crucify it.»
I asked, «Well, then where’s all this anger coming from?» The Lord said, «Son, look at the gold ring on your finger.» Lisa had given me a white gold ring at that time, but it was yellow gold. He said, «Is that ring pure gold?» I said, «No, it’s 14-karat gold,» and I knew that 14-karat means 14 parts out of 24 are gold, and 10 parts are impurities: nickel, copper, zinc. He then asked, «Is it pure?» I said, «No.» He said, «Does it look pure to you right now?» I said, «Oh, yeah.»
He asked, «What happens if you put it in a furnace and heat it up to 7,000 degrees?» I replied, «It becomes liquid.» He then inquired, «And then what happens?» I said, «The impurities come to the surface.» He said, «Exactly, they appear.» I said, «Yeah.» He asked, «Were they in there all along?» I said, «Yeah.» He explained, «They weren’t visible to your naked eye until the gold was put in the furnace. You wonder where all this stuff is coming from; it’s always been in you. What I’ve done is brought you into this furnace and allowed this to come to the surface so you can see it. You can continue to be mad at everybody and blame everybody, but if you do, the impurities will just go right back down, and we’ll have to start this process all over again.»
That’s why I said some people stay in their wilderness for 30 years because it’s everybody else’s fault—it’s my mom’s fault, my dad’s fault, my ex’s fault. Or you can say, «God, take this anger and bitterness out of me,» and He will take His ladle and scoop that dross right off the top. I went, «Oh God, take it out!» I want you to notice what Proverbs 25 says: «It is the glory of God to conceal a matter.» Now, let me stop right there. God does not take pleasure in exposing weaknesses in our lives to everyone else; He loves doing that, but «the glory of kings"—now stop right there. This is Solomon writing. What does First Peter say? He has made us kings and priests unto our God. What did John the Apostle write? He has made us kings and priests unto our God; we are a royal priesthood. So, I’ll read it that way: «But the glory of a Christian is to search out a matter.»
As the heavens are for height and the earth for depth, so the heart of a Christian is unsearchable. So, look at the next verse: «Take away the dross"—what’s the dross? The impurities from the silver or gold—and it will go to the silversmith or goldsmith for jewelry. «Take away the wicked from before the Christian, and his calling, his promise that God has made to him, will be established in righteousness.»
How does a believer get rid of that dross? Because the heart is unsearchable, God says, «I want you to see it. I allowed you to come into this wilderness, this desert so these things would come to the surface so they don’t destroy you.» If you look at King Saul, he never had a wilderness experience. Look at the false humility; Samuel was like, «Where is Saul?» And he was hiding among the equipment. After one great victory, he was building a monument to himself. He now thought he knew more than God and decided, «Hey, I’m going to spare the king,» when God said to do otherwise.
Saul never went through the wilderness; David did. Even though David made much greater mistakes than Saul, David was always tender and sensitive to the Lord in his desires. That’s why David finished well—and Saul didn’t. Remember what I shared from the beginning? One of the benefits of this wilderness, or I should say the wilderness, is God’s protection over our lives. He doesn’t want us to be Sauls. If you’re going through a wilderness, you need to thank God that He cares enough to allow this dross to be exposed so you can remove it from your life. That is what will ultimately destroy you, and you don’t want that happening when you’re 48 years old and well-established.
Have you ever wondered how in the world a pastor fell into sin, especially when he has a church of 8,000 people? My question is, did that pastor go through a wilderness time? Did he allow God to bring him through that, or did he immediately jump into what he knew was a gifting in his life? These are the things that God does for us in this life because He has great compassion for us. So fighting against the wilderness is not the proper approach; cooperating and displaying the right behavior is what is needed.
If you look at Peter in the New Testament, he talks about this as well. I want you to see that I’m not just taking this from the Old Testament. «In this, you greatly rejoice.» These are Peter’s words: «Though now for a little while—remember, for God, a little while can be nine months; a day with the Lord is as a thousand years—if need be, you have been grieved by various trials.» Now look at what he continues to say: «These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold. Though your faith is far more precious than mere gold, when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world.»
You know when Jesus is revealed? He is revealed through us. The testing I went through, the wildernesses I experienced, prepared me for Jesus to be revealed through me. Do you know what the qualities of gold are when it has been refined? Number one: when gold has a lot of dross, alloy in it—dross is the alloy that comes to the surface—it is very hard. But gold in its purest state is very soft; it’s flexible, it bends easily. So when we go through refining, we become more tender toward God.
The second benefit of refinement is that gold in its pure state is incorruptible; it cannot be affected by corrosion. If you look at brass, brass is very similar in color to gold, but brass can corrode. Have you ever seen what happens if it sits on a shelf for a few years? The atmosphere corrupts it. What did we just say? A person who has gone through God’s refinement is not corrupted by the atmosphere of the world we live in. However, many imitation believers in the church are easily corrupted by the world because they’re not pure gold. Isn’t that amazing?
The third thing I love about gold in its pure state is that it becomes transparent. I’m going to get kind of scriptural here: the streets of Heaven are made out of pure gold. What does the Bible say about them? They are transparent, just like glass. If I, the vessel of the Lord, become transparent, when Jesus is revealed to the world, they will see Him in me. To me, that is the greatest promise of refining.
Job makes this statement, saying, «But He knows the way that I take; when He has tried me"—remember that word «tried» means refined—"I shall come forth as refined gold.» Pure and luminous. Do you know what the definition of luminous is? It’s beautiful: giving off a very bright light or whatever person or trait is considered glowing. So, what happens? They see the glory in the vessel. Remember, we have this treasure in earthen vessels: the glory of God that shines in the face of Christ Jesus. When we have gone through His refining, we become luminous. They’re not seeing our light; they’re seeing His light. We are now a vessel through which He shines; Jesus is revealed to the world.
Here is the greatest promise regarding our service: we become vessels of honor. Look at this: Paul says to Timothy, «All who make themselves clean from evil"—those who cooperate with the refining process will be used for special purposes. They will be made holy, useful to the master, ready to do any good work. I don’t know about you guys, but I embrace God’s refining process. I remember when I was about 49 years old, coming into my 50th birthday; I prayed passionately one summer, saying, «God, I want You to refine me.» I went through the hardest three months of my life. I went to one of my board members who pastors a great church, and I said, «You know, I’ve been praying that God would refine me.» He said, «Bevere, that’s what you pray when you’re 20 years old, not when you’re 49.» We both laughed about it, but deep down, I was so glad I prayed that. God was preparing me for a new season.
Déserts until the day of His manifestation. Well, we’ll keep talking about this in the very next lesson.