Do you hear God’s voice through other people? Bill Johnson shares on the importance of community when listening for God’s voice. It is important that we hear from God for ourselves, but sometimes God chooses to speak through those around us. We must be ready with soft hearts to hear God’s voice in the many different ways He is speaking.
we don’t have it all
the bible does not say i have the mind
of christ
it says we have the mind of christ
it says our father who art in heaven
there is something that is gained in the
corporate expression that you cannot
gain any of the weight
i want you to look at a couple verses
with me
ii chronicles 20.
and ezra 6.
there’s just a theme here i’m going to
i’m going to pull on
uh i’m i’m not going to do what what i
normally like to do is more of a full
study but
in second chronicles 20
we’ve got this military conflict
we have the lord giving strategy giving
direction giving plan to the people of
god
and in verse 20
this is easy to remember 2020 clear
vision
verse 20 so they arose early in the
morning they went out to the wilderness
of tekoa
and as they went out jehoshaphat
students said hear me o judah
and inhabitants of jerusalem
believe in the lord your god and you
shall be established
believe his prophets
and you shall prosper
okay now listen carefully i want you to
um
i want you to
hear this over and over again in your
heart
believe in the lord your god
and you shall be established
believe his prophets
and you shall prosper
there’s this crazy idea
that has entered
much of the church
that because i am a child of god
all i need is him
i love people i care for people i spend
my life with people but essentially my
life depends directly on god speaking to
me and caring for me
there’s enough truth to that to keep
people in deception
my need
to hear from god for myself
does not nullify my need for the
prophets
my need of the prophets does not cancel
out my need to hear from god for myself
they work in tandem
the way most of us function if he only
spoke to us directly
we would become independent
we would use what he said to prove we’re
superior
we would argue proving we’re right and
someone else is wrong
when the word comes through community
it affects community
it
blesses community
and it emphasizes our need for one
another
the bible says we are members of one
another and uses the physical body
to illustrate what it looks like to be
joined together
in acts chapter 2 we won’t go there but
in acts chapter 2 king david is actually
called a prophet
a prophet is someone who hears directly
from the lord
but when he wanted to build a temple
for god
god wouldn’t talk to him
if god is silent it’s never punishment
it’s either because he has already
spoken and you need to review what
you’ve heard
or he’s trying to connect you with the
right people that will add into your
life the missing piece
because it emphasizes connection
it emphasizes the fact we don’t have it
all
the bible does not say i have the mind
of christ
it says we have the mind of christ
it says our father who art in heaven
there is something that is gained in the
corporate expression
that you cannot gain any other way this
excites me now
um
the healing revival how many of you have
read anything or heard anything about
the healing revival back in 1948 on into
the 50s
some of the most extraordinary things
literally that the world has ever seen
happen in that era
but it was all through
the generals of the army
it was the season it was the generals of
the army
what god is doing in this hour is the
generals are equipping the saints so
picture it this way here’s this high
level of anointing that nobody can reach
to so this general of the army equips
all the saints around him until they
come into a place of anointing that was
once only occupied by the generals of
the army
that releases them to explore even
greater dimensions and realms in the
spirit of god so that we can manifest
jesus much more clearly in glory in
power and presence in purity
i remember chris do you mind if i share
your story of william branham you’re
asking the lord for for
is that all right yeah i i ask him in
public so that he’s shamed if he says no
no
no i i i wouldn’t i wouldn’t do that
yeah
so bad joke bad joke bad bad timing no
no class at all right there
um i was i was really inspired by uh
this happened i don’t know maybe 15
years or so ago
chris was asked one of the great heroes
that we’ve had in in the realms of
anointing is a man named william branham
tragic things at the end but that
doesn’t mess up how god used it
solomon still made it into the book
value what god values if you want to
live smart
favor who he favors
all right
um he asked the lord
lord i want to i want to i want his gift
i want to operate in his anointing
something to that effect and the lord
spoke very clearly he says you couldn’t
handle it
am i right you couldn’t handle it
and
chris then came back and said
well then don’t give it to me only give
it to the to the entire church
and the moment he had in the lord if i
remember correctly
is that he felt the the lord was pleased
over his response it wasn’t about him
having an anointing that draws
everybody’s attention it was about the
church coming into a place in god that
represents jesus more clearly
i i love that i love that example so
much i’ve used it a number of times
so here is this
powerful moment in israel’s history
and it says
they believed god
and they believed his prophets
interesting in scripture it says and
israel believed god and they believed
moses
they weren’t contradictory
it was necessary to see
a co-laboring expression of what it
looked like to trust god
it’s easy to say i trust god and don’t
trust any people
because it can’t be measured
john put it another way it’s easy to say
you love god whom you can’t see and hate
your brother whom you can see
it’s illegal to claim a spiritual
reality that cannot be measured in the
natural
so i love god with all my heart it has
you have to be able to examine and
measure it in how i treat people it’s
what validates that unseen reality that
i am supposed to walk in
it’s the same in faith
it requires a faith
in the giftings of god not the people
are always 100
but the spirit of god is within us to
help us weed through the times there’s
error or their opinion has been added to
a word
that’s the truth
in the old testament the prophets were
judged in the new testament prophecy is
judged
get chris’s teaching on this it’s good
but it’s
[Applause]
if there were royalties from the message
tonight chris i’d give them all to you i
would give them all to you
yes
so here it says they believed god and
they believed his prophets it says they
believed god and they believed moses
gideon at one point says
give this shout it’s a shout of
declaration shout out praise here to
break these these vases with candles and
it’s a weird story break these candles
and then shout for the lord and for
giving
sometimes we can live
impressed by our own faith that cannot
be measured
when in fact it is measured by our
confidence in the sovereignty of god to
use the people around us to fill it in
where we lack
it’s called trust
so it says
believe the lord your god you will be
established believe his prophets and you
will prosper anybody in here want to
prosper
now i know that i know that some are too
holy for it and and i get it
i get it you don’t need it but the rest
of us really want to prosper
i’ve told
every every once while i tell people i
said listen if if you’re not hungry for
more than you’re just being selfish
yeah it’s the most acceptable form of
selfishness
because it proves to me you’re untouched
by the needs of people around you
that’s not you that’s it that my other
folks it’s their mother folks it’s it’s
not even you on tv it’s not you either
it’s everybody else