I am thankful for many things: some big, some small. But I want you to know that I am most thankful for the love and presence of our Lord Jesus Christ! He has made us, He calls us, He thinks thoughts of love and hope and purpose for us, and He pours out His Spirit into our lives. I am thankful that my God is alive and that He is all powerful and that He not only said He would be with us, but that He would be in us! I am thankful that I don’t have to walk this sod alone. I am thankful that I am not left to my own devices nor to my own inclinations. God knows what we need when we need it and if we will but turn to Him and cry out in our desperation and need, He will hear from heaven and heal our land! I am thankful that the Holy Spirit is a real, living, present Being! He is not an idea, a fairy tale, a legend, an impersonal force, a future reality or an unknown, indefinable quasi-real theological idea or man-made construct. The Holy Spirit is the power of God! He is the glory of God! He is the presence of God and He is very present to those who believe and seek Him with all of their hearts. I am thankful for our loving Father, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and the promised and now here Holy Spirit. I am thankful that the Lord is near to those who call on Him. Are you calling on Him? Are you thankful for the Lord?!
Our desperate need for revival
We all “know” that we need revival, but therein is exactly the problem. We “know” it: with our mind. We don’t grieve in our spirit that God’s Spirit is not present in our lives or churches. We don’t have heaviness on our heart for the lack of passion for God and His Word. We don’t weep and mourn and wail for the lostness of people or the emptiness we feel in our lives apart from God. But intellectually we ‘know’ that we need revival. Kind of like we know that we should eat more vegetable. Like we know we should sleep more. Like we know we should spend more time with God. But we don’t have the time. We don’t have the energy. We don’t have the will power. And that too betrays what is really going on in our hearts. We think that to have revival we need to try harder. We think that to have revival we need to put forth more effort. In a sense we do, but really all that is need for revival is desperate waiting on God: desperate crying out to God. We need to admit our weaknesses, admit the impossible situations, and admit the filthy rags that we have previously called our own ‘goodness’. And then we must wait. In the waiting God will shine a light on our hearts and then we will only be even more convinced and convicted of our need for revival. Our need is revealed in our apathy, in our ignorance and in our souls. Pray that God will show you your own desperate need for revival!
To those who poured faith and life into me
Life and ministry seem daunting, overwhelming and yes impossible.
There are a few people in life who have found the peace that God intends for His people. God desires that His people have peace in the midst of the storm, strength in the midst of weakness and a deeply settled rest in the deepest part of their souls. The people who have found this deep peace are people of great faith, though I imagine they did not begin that way. These persons who are firm and secure and cannot be shaken are only created after having been shaken, broken, re-molded and reshaped by the Lord Himself. I want to be one who has His peace within!
God has promised that His people can enter His rest. He has promised that all who are weary and heavy laden may come to Him and He will give them rest. God has told us that we can take His yoke upon us which is easy and light. And yet most often we take these Bible verses to be nice spiritual platitudes rather than actual, tangible promises that God will pour into our lives. But I want to be one who enters His rest!
I have been searching over the course of my life for meaning, purpose, calling, love, peace, joy, contentment and rest. I have sought in different ways and have settled for many pitiful expressions of these things, because ultimately all of these things are only fully realized in the presence of the Lord. And let me clarify: meaning, purpose, calling, love, joy, peace, contentment and rest are not gifts that are given from the hand of God, but rather present realities that are experienced in the Presence of God. I want to live in the presence of the Almighty!
All along my journey of life and ministry I have chosen many lesser things and meanwhile there was always someone along the way who knew that what I was really hungry for, what my heart and soul were really yearning for was the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. These people were humble and gentle with me, shepherding my soul trying to guide me, lead me and push me to Jesus. These were men and women who poured the life of the Spirit and the faith of God into my life when I was too arrogant to hear, too stubborn to listen, too self-sufficient to ask for help and too driven to stop and wait. These people modeled for me Isaiah 53 and the suffering Messiah as they listened to my pathetic schemes to find full and abundant life and loved me in the midst of my foolishness. They watched as I headed down many wrong paths and fell into many pits and yet they simply continued to pray and pour their faith into me hoping and believing that one day I would call out to the Lord. I want to never stop calling out to the Lord!
Perhaps these men and women know the impact they have made on my life, perhaps not. But for all of you who may read this post and wonder whether your prayers, words, attitudes and actions make any difference, let me assure you: they do! My mom and dad modeled faith in the midst of trial, sacrifice in the midst of scarcity and that God’s truth is everywhere if we will look for His revelations. Greg Wood, Richard Reed, Don Boesel and Don Cowan believed that God was working in me in spite of my impetuous, arrogant, stubborn, always have-a-plan-and-an-answer attitude that I approached life and ministry with. They were patient with me and let me stumble into new areas of faith and growth and for that I am thankful. Aaron Coffey listened, sympathized and encouraged me with no personal benefit in return. Corey Jones and Tim Kellerman had faith that God would show me His glory when I didn’t even know what they were talking about. Their few words and simple faith-filled prayers lifted me in ways that words can not express. Dan and Doug Bohi have spoken life into me and my wife by the Spirit of God and have allowed God to flow through them as a conduit while probably not knowing the direct, personal affect they were having on me and my wife and yet they made themselves available to the Lord and to us nonetheless. I want to be a conduit of God’s grace and a vessel that God’s Spirit lives in and through!
This is a brief and incomplete list and a pitiful attempt to convey the deep debt that I owe each person who has prayed and believed, but I want each of you who have asked and believed the Lord to work in my life to know that your prayers have not been in vain, but the Lord has been and is continuing to answer what you have lifted before Him! God is shaking me, breaking me, re-molding and remaking me!
And so now I want to commit that to those around me who don’t know what they are looking for; for those around me who are scrambling, grasping, reaching for things to fill the emptiness: I will lift you before the Father; I will seek to pour the life of the Spirit and the faith of God into you, so that whether you know it or not, God may begin to reveal Himself to you as He has revealed himself to me because of the faith of other men and women who asked and believed! Thank you Father for your faith-filled children who had faith enough to bring me to you! Bless and honor them I pray for their sacrifice and their faith and obedience! Lord help us to call out to you that you will be our All in all and that you will bring peace to our troubled souls!!
I want to dedicate this song to all those who believed for me when I didn’t know enough to believe or couldn’t or wouldn’t believe for myself:
I have found a deep peaceAuthor: Haldor Lillenas Refrain My wonderful Lord, my wonderful Lord I desire that my life shall be ordered by Thee Refrain All the talents I have I have laid at Thy Feet Refrain Thou art fairer to me than the fairest of earth Refrain |
We need Thee, oh we need Thee!
What a desperate need we have for Jesus Christ! We think we know how to approach life. We “know” how to make plans, organize lives, get things done, set goals, develop ministry strategies and yet we fail again and again in personal lives and in ministry. As Scripture says about us: unless the Lord build the house the builders labor in vain. Our only hope is the Lord. Our only hope is calling upon and waiting upon the Lord. No matter what we attempt, no matter our efforts or intentions, apart from the Lord we labor in vain. We must begin to cry out to the Lord. And I say begin, because once we start we simply should not, cannot stop ever again. We must realize that only utter desperation and dependence on the Lord will bring about the character formation, mind transformation, heart transplantation and Spirit indwelling that we need!
Waiting for the Lord
They that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run , and not be weary ; and they shall walk , and not faint . Isaiah 40:31
What does it mean to wait before the Lord? And when we wait what are we waiting for? And epiphany? A vision? A mighty roaring entry of His presence like the train of a robe (as Isaiah describes it)? Or is it something more? Something different?
I have been waiting before God. Not for long. And certainly not in all the ways I could or should. But God has been teaching me to wait. To wait for His perfect timing, to wait for His miracles, to wait for His providence, to wait for His glory. But the beautiful thing is that waiting is not laborious. Thousands of times before it has been difficult, trying and unpleasant. But that was because I was waiting for God to do something for me instead of me simply waiting in the presence of God. I think we have confused the definition for waiting on God to presume a delayed, indefinite, agonizing time of suffering and painful discipline, with the kind of waiting on God which simply sits at His feet and gazes on His beauty. The waiting on God in the present and in His presence and simply finding joy in who He is, is so much better than the waiting on God for some unknown future date and time when He might give us what we want (or think we want).
I have for far too long perceived of prayer as the necessary ‘key’ to get what I want from God. In a crass kind of way I visualized prayer as the the manner in which I would stroke the genie’s bottle in order to get my ‘three wishes’. What a travesty! What a shame! Prayer is not about getting things from God, it is about being with God. Prayer is about living in the midst of God’s glory and realizing that there is no other place you would rather be!
And when you wait on the Lord, He will meet you there. You may not walk away with your circumstances changed or with the shiny, new thing you have begged off of God, but you will leave changed. You will leave fulfilled. And hopefully, prayerfully, you will never leave the presence of the Lord. Yes you may leave the prayer closet, prayer room or sanctuary, but when we abide in the presence of God, may we never leave Him! Oh God may Your glory come and cover me like a robe, like a mighty, never-ending waterfall of Your goodness! Lord may I sit at Your feet a while longer?
Oh the Glory!
Oh the glory of Your presence, we your temple, give You reverence!
What is the glory of God? What is the presence of God? What does it look like to see the manifest presence of Almighty God?
Can words describe it when the Holy Spirit descends on His people? Are there certain activities, characteristics or behaviors that are present when God’s Holy Spirit comes? Are there certain things that we can do as His worshipers to invite the presence of the Holy Spirit? All of these and more are questions that I have rolling around in my head after a week of prayer, worship, healings, miracles, corporate faithing, testimony, confession, laying on of hands and the glory of God coming upon His people. I can’t really put into words all that I experienced. I will try to somehow pass along what God has revealed to me so that I might somehow be a blessing to others and invite others to experience the mysterious and mighty presence of God.
This last week I attended a “conference” in Fort Worth to consider prayer and that we might be pushed towards corporate desperation for the glory and presence of God. The conference and the desperation of the attendees was expressed in words, groans, crying out, interceding, shouting, crying, worship, praise, humility and brokenness. From the time the first prayer service began it was obvious that the leaders (and likely many of the participants) had been crying out for God’s mercy to be upon His people and for God to do signs, wonders and miracles among His people and thereby transform the hearts and minds of broken people. Each prayer service and teaching session was marked by prayers with “loud cries and tears” as the people just invited God to change our understanding and experience of Him (in most of our lives/churches) from “Ichobod” (the glory has departed) to “Ebenezer” (living sacrifices placed on the altar). During these sessions people experienced physical, emotional, spiritual and relational healing. Chains were broken, faith was imparted and built, prophetic words were uttered for the edifying of God’s people and above all God’s name was glorified!
The only identifiable things that the leaders did to prepare for this conference was desperation, prayer, fasting and saturation in the Word. The manifestations of God’s presence included shouts of praise, agreement in prayer, more desperation and much testimony. It was not a program, a song, certain magical or mystical words that brought about the presence of God and no it was not an emotional, chaotic gathering of people trying to have a ‘spiritual’ experience. It was nothing short of the throne room and the glory of God!
I pray that we would each seek after the glory of God! I pray that we would learn with Mary what it is to sit at the feet of Jesus and listen. I want to touch the hem of His robe and sense His power pouring over me. I pray that we would refuse to accept anything less than the manifest presence of God in our lives and our churches. Will you pray that prayer with me? Can we together learn what it is to be broken, empty, weak vessels that God fills and uses?
Making Disciples
Why is it so important to make disciples? Disciples of who? And whose job is it really?
We hear a lot of talk these days about making disciples. As a matter of fact, we are hearing so much from so many places that we might begin to wonder if this is really a movement of God’s Spirit on His people or if it is merely a fad and another church growth method to make our churches appear “successful”. If it is such a Biblical concept and so central to the identity of the church, why did the church of the 20th century not spend so much time and attention on it? Is discipleship in the 21st century just another name for something done regularly by the previous generations?
We certainly are aware that Jesus told His disciples to “Go and make disciples” and of course they had an understanding of what that meant because they has just been following Jesus around for three years and receiving instruction from Him on what it was to be a part of the kingdom of God and a disciple of Christ. For us, it seems a little more difficult to comprehend what discipleship looks like in the 21st century especially without a physical Jesus to follow around.
The disciples of Jesus in the 1st century A.D. followed Him around learning from Him about the kingdom of God and how to live on this earth. They watched Him bring healing to the lame, blind, demon-possessed, epileptic, hopeless, hungry and hurting. The disciples did what Jesus told them to do and went on ahead of Him to the villages He was about to go and they prepared the way by preaching the gospel and by healing people in the name and power of Jesus.
Making disciples today really is no different. We follow Jesus around. We sit at His feet and listen. We go out and prepare the way for Him to come and bring His salvation to all who will believe and receive it. Making disciples is going and getting our brother and saying “We have found Him the Messiah” – Andrew (John 1:41).
And so making disciples is not a new fad or phenomenon but rather one of the oldest components of the Christian church. Many programs and methods have been used across the centuries to make disciples, and sometimes the efforts were because of false motives but that does not release us from our responsibility to make disciples. And the disciples that we are making are not of us but of Jesus. We are to point people to His power, to His message, to His love and to His kingdom. They are not to look more like us but more like Him.
So who should be making these disciples? And when? And how?
We could make a long drawn out discussion of this. We could put together committees and task-forces and think-tanks or we could each just go and find our brothers and sisters, friends and enemies and strangers and tell them “We have found the Messiah”. Really that is the only really honest, faithful and true approach. If we have to have a mission statement, or a training seminar or a boost of self-confidence before we are able to tell people about Jesus then we are not relying on His Spirit, strength and salvation but on our own. We must make disciples today! Now! Before it is too late! Making disciples is not about a church program, church service, about success, popularity or acceptance. It is about loving people enough to tell them about the love of God that can truly save them for now and forevermore.
Consider this your re-commissioning: “Go and make disciples”!
More lessons learned from marathon training
If you have ever (or never) run before the likelihood that you have at some point thought that running was ‘stupid’. People ask runners “why would you punish yourself like that?” and “how can running be ‘fun’?”. I myself have been that person. And yet now that I am running I feel completely different about it. It’s one of those things that you can’t “knock it, ’till you’ve tried it”. But even so I recently found myself thinking again “this is dumb”, “whoever thought this up?”. It was on my first 5k run ever. And it wasn’t the distance or the speed that bothered me. Two things bothered me: running alone and running in circles (literally). Whoever thought that running around a track was a great thing to do was crazy: you don’t get anywhere and you don’t see anything (except the next bit of pavement). Furthermore, why would anyone want to run alone? It’s lonely, easy to quit and feels a lot more like exercise than fun. I run because it is fun. I run because I get the privilege of being with my wife and my friends. I run because of the goals to achieve and the benefits to my body, soul and spirit. I don’t run for exercise. And so that brings me now to a few more ministry lessons I have learned from running:
- Don’t run alone, grab a group of people who are passionate about running the course with you to the end.
- Don’t run in circles, find a destination, a goal, a worthy cause and set your sights on that finish line.
- Find joy in the journey, notice God’s creation, see new sights, hear new sounds, smell new smells. Let the joy of the Lord be your strength for running.
- Don’t settle, there is always something to be discovered as you run a little faster and little farther. There are new lessons and new destinations that God has in store for you.
I am sure to share more lessons later, but that is it for now. Now, GO, run the course God has set for you!
Jesus’ Ministry of Words (and Healing)
I have been preaching a sermon series entitled “Jesus in my shoes” and have looked at numerous aspects of Jesus’ life on earth. Just last Sunday I completed a sermon entitled “Jesus in my words” and shared a number of things that defined Jesus’ words and should therefore be descriptive of our words as well.
As I have continued to think about this topic and read up on Jesus’ words in the gospels I have come to the conclusion that Jesus’ ministry was a ministry of words and of healing. Those appear to be the key facets of His ministry. Granted, His ministry was all about people, and restoring the love relationship between His Father and humanity, but the way that He went about it revolved around the words that He spoke and the healing that He offered.
I am beginning to realize that the ministry of words that God has called me to is very important. I have often thought that my words were the least important aspect of my ministry and yet what better calling than to follow in the footsteps of Jesus and be referred to as ‘teacher’.
And so I am reconsidering the power and value of my words and the importance of study and preparation and prayer so that I speak the right words and refrain from the wrong words. As Jesus’ words inaugurated the arriving kingdom of God on earth, even so our words can advance the kingdom of God into enemy territory, reclaim what belongs to God and give God the glory for bringing it all about. Wow! The power of words.
Marathon Training and Ministry, part 2
So I am really digging this running thing. I have been reading up on what to wear and how to train and what to eat, and it is really fun! (And the physical benefits aren’t bad either). But perhaps even more interesting is what marathon training has to say to us about ministry (and really about all of life and spiritual development).
I mentioned in my previous post that in order to run a marathon in 6 months I have to do certain things on a regular basis leading up to the day of the race. The same is therefore true about life and spiritual development. If I want to be a man of prayer, I need to practice praying, if my church wants to be alive and impactful on its community we must serve and make disciples. In order to be ready for a race we have to train. And training often takes the form of small doses spread out over a long period of time that look almost insignificant by themselves and perhaps minuscule in their progress over the previous dose and yet collectively the results can be quite impressive!
So what things should we be doing as disciples and disciple-makers in order to achieve a synergy that far surpasses the simple collective of all of the individual parts? Am I doing the things in prayer, spiritual conversations, personal invitations, gospel presentations, one-on-one discipleship, Bible reading, accountability and service that really will make me the man of God I want to be in 6 months, 5 years, or a lifetime? Am I stepping up the intensity of my ‘workouts’? Am I making sure not to ‘run’ alone? Am I pacing myself? Am I hydrating and nourishing myself so that I can have the health and stamina to finish the race? Am I actually running the right race?
All of these are questions I have been asking myself and lessons I have been learning from running. Perhaps I will begin to change my spiritual and ministry training regimen and maybe even the way I ‘run’. Perhaps we all need to examine our health, our training and our progress. Let’s be careful to finish the race God has called us to!
Acts 20:24 NIV
However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me–the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.
Pastor Michael Johnson 