Bill Johnson concludes the series “God of Reformation” by teaching about repentance and compassion through the historical cities Nineveh, Sodom, and Gomorrah. Repentance is at the heart and soul of every move of God.
bethel family uh
local global i guess it all merges uh in
this season
um hopefully we will be back together
locally
here in this building soon i am i’m
almost ready to start holding my breath
in anticipation because i can i can just
i can feel it i can feel it coming
um today is the third and final week
on the uh series that we’re doing on
reformation
um man i’d love to visit it again it’s
i’m so
i was so encouraged when towards the
beginning of the year
eric told me the different series that
we’d be doing throughout the year
and one of my most favorite subjects on
the planet is the subject of reformation
i years ago i i kind of was talking to
friends and
and told them i i really had uh
you know i had so much interest in the
subject of reformation i don’t remember
how it happened i
i i i know one thing that happened is
stacy campbell was here
and uh she gave me a prophetic word up
in our upper room
uh in the green room during uh one of
our conferences and she prophesied over
me for
i don’t know maybe five or ten minutes
it was a very very moving
and uh compelling word for me and it was
uh it had its roots in the concept of
reformation
and what god had done in geneva
specifically through calvin and a bunch
of guys
they just basically they believed that
the bible had
answers for every one of men’s dilemmas
problems
issues in life and bringing a culture
back to biblical biblically divine
defined values was in many ways the
heart of that reformation so anyway
i i remember uh just saying oh man i i
need to
you know i go to switzerland i need to
just go to geneva sometime and
and um and just uh just research
just you know travel around the city and
try to try to get some sense
feel for the subject of reformation and
a long story short
some dear friends uh now very dear
friends of ours
uh bedros and rebecca um
lead a wonderful ministry there and they
uh bedos reached out to me and he said
listen if you come to
if you come to switzerland i’ll pick you
up bring it to geneva
and which he ended up doing and just
drove me around the city
benny and i around the city for uh a
couple days as we just would
visit reformation sites and the museum
and read the stories and
it was just moving i i i believe every
move of god
has in its basic
um in the seed of every move of god
carries the potential for a reformation
every visitation of god to me carries
the possibility the potential of revival
that is not supposed to end until
there’s true reformation
of culture society and it’s just it’s
just a huge subject it’s not
something that i i feel qualified to
to deal with in any uh any
great with any great success today but i
will touch on it
but having said all of that as i have
been thinking
praying towards looking forward to this
opportunity to be able to talk to you
about this
a favorite subject of mine i have i have
felt the dealings of the lord i don’t
use that
that kind of terminology with you very
often but i have
over recent weeks been feeling the
dealings of the lord
on our need our need
as a people a movement but as a nation
our need to return to the basics the
fundamentals
and i i want to read to you a verse that
many of you can quote
but i want to read i actually have quite
a few scriptures written down on paper
so i won’t have to
necessarily turn to each because i
really want to try to use the time well
i’ll give you the reference
but this first one where i want to start
today it’s not the portion we’re going
to study but it’s the
part that i want to start today is
second chronicles
7 14. i want you to listen carefully
if my people who are called by my name
will humble themselves and pray
and seek my face and turn from their
wicked ways
then i will hear from heaven and will
forgive their sin
and heal their land let me read it again
if my people
who are called by my name we keep
waiting for the world to repent
when god is saying the healing of the
land is dependent upon my people
repenting if my people who are caught by
my name
will humble themselves and pray and seek
my
face turn from their wicked ways
then i will hear from heaven and will
forgive their sin
and heal their land
this profound picture is of
the wonderful union between jesus
and his people where in this passage
the sin the rebellions the independence
the attitudes the all the
you know the wrong values all the junk
gets removed
and that fellowship becomes so tender
and so dear
that it overflows into the healing of
the earth itself
for me it’s the beginning place of all
true reformation and let me
let me just put it this way repentance
is at the heart and soul
of every great move of god it’s out the
heart and soul
because god will actually put his
blessing on an
unbeliever before he’ll put his blessing
on a carnal believer
the scripture says that blessing is
god’s calling card he will actually
touch an
unbeliever with his favor and his
blessing hoping that they will want more
of that and turn their hearts to seek
him it’s very clear in scripture
but it’s also clear that judgment has to
begin with a household of god
first why is that if it starts with the
world
it requires condemnation if it starts
with the church
it makes us pure which enables us to
bring more people into the kingdom
it must start with you and with me
repentance is at the heart of this thing
repentance the absolute turning from
every known
thing that would defile or compromise
our values our lifestyles
the focus of our life for many years
i’ve i have emphasized the true meaning
of the word repentance and
and uh i’m i’m not sorry for for that at
all
the the word repentance means to change
the way think change your mind about
something
and i believe in that very strongly
because it when i was growing up
it was not uh it was not an emphasized
part of repentance the crying at the
altar was the emphasized part
and here i want to make a not a
mid-course correction but i want to add
something to our definition first of all
repentance is
the changing of the way you think but
the bible says
godly sorrow leads to repentance
godly sorrow there is the place
for deep internal remorse for everything
that has defiled us
or has caused us to be off course it’s
not living in regret
it’s not living in regret over things
that jesus has forgiven it’s not that
it’s just the absolute realization that
i
am alive because of the mercy of god
and we’re going to look at a couple
stories today i’m going to i’m going to
try to
weave some very large stories into a
very small
period of time and see if we can help to
make sense of this
journey that we find through scripture
on how
god extends his mercy to a group of
people
and he heals their relationships their
relationship with him
families all of that get healed but the
land itself the
the earth the the agriculture the
political systems the educational
systems everything about
community life starts to come into place
and i would like to suggest that that
kind of repentance right there
is the seed of a great reformation
and i believe that the lord is actually
we’re it we’re we’re living at a time
with obviously the pandemic the
political stuff
we’ve got so many things that are
hanging in the balance
that if there was one word that i could
talk to every believer
in our country and i know we have so
many other nations that are
participating in the service and i would
encourage you to take this
tart as well but if there’s one verse
i could give to every born-again person
in this nation it would be
ii chronicles 7 14. if my people
and i would say look at me guys listen
to me
live this as full as you possibly can
because we have right now we have things
that will affect
multiple generations ahead hanging in
the balance right now and what we’ve got
to have
is a visitation of god we’ve got to have
an
invasion of the almighty one who would
come
in and among us and bring healing and
it’s
always to places we don’t deserve
so that’s that’s kind of where i want to
start today i’m going to um
i’m going to read a verse
out of the book of ezekiel if you want
to turn there with me
most of these references i’m just going
to uh
just give to you quickly and then
and then read it off the paper that i i
have printed out
but here’s a verse i want to talk to you
about three different cities i want to
talk to you about sodom
gomorrah and nineveh
all three cities had the absolute
judgment of god
pronounced towards them
now i realize that judgment of god is
not a very popular subject
but get used to it it’s still in the
bible and he didn’t take off his judge
hat when he became savior
if i can put it this way if you were to
have discovered cancer
in your body you would not want to go to
a doctor
that believed that cancer should have
its own free life and its own free
expression you would want a doctor that
would bring judgment on that which is
working to destroy your life and in the
same way we
want the mercy of god on our lives but
the judgment of god that cuts off
everything that wars against our own
destiny
mike bickel says it best he says god’s
judgments are always
aimed at whatever interferes with love
god’s judgments are always aimed at
whatever interferes with love
and so it’s something that we want as
blood washed saints as those who
have given ourselves to live to follow
to serve jesus to honor him with our
whole life
the judgment of god is the very thing
that we need is very sobering
and right now we need a heavy heavy dose
of the fear of god
released into our nation so here let me
read to you
we know that sodom and gomorrah were
destroyed nineveh was spirit
we’re going to just try to take a real
quick look if we can
at these three cities out of ezekiel
chapter did i tell you the chapter 16
chapter 16 verse 49 this is a very very
sobering verse
i want to remind you sodom and gomorrah
were destroyed
it’s it’s a cultural phenomenon people
who don’t read the bible
know about sodom and gomorrah and why
they were destroyed they were destroyed
for their immorality they were destroyed
for their gross gross perversion
sexually and so many other things that
had become a part of their
excuse me ongoing lifestyle but here in
ezekiel 16 verse 49
it says look this was the iniquity of
your sister sodom
she and her daughter had pride
fullness of food abundance
of idleness neither did she strengthen
the hand of the poor
and the needy
abundance of food spare time
and it wasn’t used for the poor and the
needy
i would like to suggest to you
that abundance in our life
has to find expression through
compassion
or it will be misused and abused
it has to find release through
compassion
the pharisees would complain to jesus
because he would heal on the sabbath day
what was missing
the compassion for the paralytic who had
no use of his arm
that’s what was missing they were more
concerned about keeping the rules and
they were somebody being set free
it’s over and over and over again the
complete absence of compassion is what
caused them to be so blind so blind to
their own
heart’s condition so blind to the cries
the needs of the people around them
that they they completely severed their
hearts from being
moved by this divine
expression called compassion
we see peter and john are walking to the
gate beautiful
and there’s a lame man there
and peter looks at him and he in acts
chapter 3
he says he’s there begging for for money
and peter says i don’t silver and gold
have i none but what i have i give to
you
catch that what i have
i give to you
just follow me on this on this little uh
this
this little logical journey here what i
have
i give to you many people don’t function
in the miraculous because they don’t
know what they have
let’s say that i had ten thousand
dollars cash in my pocket
and i go downtown and i’ve got all these
got a hundred hundred dollar bills here
i’ve got all this money here in my
pockets
and i walk past a somebody asking
for food first of all
if i have surplus money and i do nothing
then i obviously am not moved with
compassion and i hear all the time well
we don’t want them to go by drugs or
alcohol or whatever
i get that but there’s another issue i
can’t use their misuse
as my excuse to do nothing the
possibility of them
sinning with what i give them cannot
keep me from what i
need most and that is to move in
compassion
to do something to contribute to their
life now let’s change the story a little
bit let’s say that ten thousand dollars
every time i pull a hundred dollar bill
out it gets replaced it’s a supernatural
thing
no matter how much i give away it gets
replaced
that actually is a better description of
what it is to minister in the anointing
because you don’t release anointing and
power in
a miracle setting and lose something
it is always replenished it is unending
supply
the reason miracles are supposed to be
a regular part of our life is because
they actually express
the compassion of god you and i can show
compassion by
showing sympathy and and i don’t want to
say any of these things are bad i’m just
saying
biblical compassion leads to a solution
sympathy leads to comfort
in a problem but not a solution and i
believe that the lord would heighten our
awareness right now of something that
actually was at the
foundation of the fall of sodom and
gomorrah
is that they had all these perversions
and these things that developed out of
their surplus time
surplus money surplus food and the
absence of compassion
they developed into a self-seeking
culture which sounds a whole lot
like a place i’m very familiar with that
we all live in
surplus time surplus money and i realize
that’s not everybody but
as a culture what happens when you have
extra and it’s not directed
towards serving the needs of people
around you is we become
insulated and isolated from world need
if i walked past the person and i didn’t
do something you could say i was not
moved with compassion but here’s the
deal
jesus announced the spirit of the lord
god is upon me
to release captives to open the eyes of
the blind what is it what did he do
he declared his realization
that he had what was needed by that
blind person he had what was needed by
that lame person
i hope this is making sense that when
you
when you are aware of what you have and
it’s what it’s what peter said to the
lame man he says such as i have
i give you he knew he carried an eternal
flame
if you will sorry i need to call fear
it’s not coping
[Laughter]
i promise it is not coped it was a
tickle in my throat
leave me alone all right i’m i’m teasing
all right so here’s this here’s this um
the compulsion to give out of what you
have
i believe we know that authority comes
in our lives through the commission it’s
our yielding to what god has commanded
us to do but power comes in the
encounter
this is why this is why encounters with
god are so essential
because they cause you to be aware of
what you have
it’s not just it’s not just reading a
verse and claiming it i i
believe in that and i i try to practice
a huge part of my life is that
it’s it’s finding what god says in his
word and come before him in prayer and
just contend until there’s breakthrough
i believe in that
but i’m just telling you right now
we need the kind of encounters that are
unexplainable
unreasonable unmanageable
outside of our control so that we come
face to face with the fact
that god is upon me
and i am impacted by him who has no
limitation
he has no boundaries he has no
restrictions or restraints
except in some measure my willingness to
cooperate with him
obviously he can do whatever he wants
but you get the picture he primarily
flows through yielded people
and when we don’t yield when we look at
the problem as an impossibility
and don’t think in terms of what i have
what i have
i give to you peter gave something
that he didn’t have in and of himself
and that was the capacity
to walk given to a lame man here’s
here’s the story sodom and gomorrah
abundance time
and needs only two of those things
mattered to them
was the abundance and the time the
excess time
not the needy people and because of that
that brokenness in how we do life
as a culture as a society actually
became
a wide open door for the demonic to come
in
and create a playground of absolute
perversion but it started with
excess that wasn’t directed towards
helping serving loving people
and i’d like to suggest that whether
it’s sodom and gomorrah or it’s the
pharisees with religious
institutions and organizations both have
the absolute same
corruption at its core it’s the absence
of compassion
in the absence of a real heart for
people
jonah is um
is a personal favorite of mine i i’m i’m
working on a book right now and
and i i just this last week was writing
about jonah
and i i’ve i’ve had this in mind for a
while i
it feels like it feels like maybe one of
the most
underrated miracles in the entire bible
is the healing of a city called nineveh
if if you want an example
of reformation if you want an example of
repentance
that becomes the seedbed of a
transformation of society itself
look no further than the story of jonah
and nineveh god speaks to this prophet
jonah tells him to go on to preach
and interestingly he he doesn’t tell
jonah
go and tell them unless they repent they
will be destroyed
he said just go tell him i’m going to
destroy him
there was no offer of repentance there
was no promise there was nothing given
just the announcement jonah of course uh
flees from the presence of god
this is weird nineveh repents jonah
runs from the presence of god
ah i’ll get to it in a minute
i’m getting ahead of myself i can feel
it this story
john has the assignment to go to nineveh
walk the streets repent he runs from the
presence of god gets on a boat
thrown overboard to save everybody on
the on the boat which is an interesting
comparison the entire boat that paul was
on in the book of acts everybody was
spared because he was
there but everybody just about died
because jonah was in this one
they throw him overboard he’s swallowed
by a fish
he remembers the lord which is probably
a good idea if you ever get eaten by a
fish
and he uh he repents and
the fish pukes him up on the beach which
if you can imagine sunbathing on the
beach the day that
a man is barfed in your presence
you probably would listen to something
he had to say i’m not sure but anyway he
walks the streets it takes him
three full days if i remember right to
walk the street to
to walk from one end of the city to the
other announcing
judgment is coming in 30 days or
whatever
the word gets all the way to the king
and they announce that they’re going to
repent and see if by chance god might
have mercy on them
and and they do they repent i mean
from the greatest to the least they all
wore sackcloth and ashes they
they literally sat in in an ash heap
they
they’re they’re in their their mourning
place they even required the animals to
fast
that’s that’s just bizarre it’s such a
deep sense
of judgment coming upon them that they
deserved
there was such clarity in their thinking
that their repentance was not a casual
oh god forgive me for that that was a
that was a real bummer i’m sorry
it wasn’t that the deeper the sin
into who you are the deeper the
repentance needs to be not to
earn forgiveness somehow but to know
that you’re actually dealing with
something that must be permanently
uprooted
from our life and the mercy of god of
course comes as they
are bowing in repentance and for days
they’re in this place of
repenting before the lord and uh and
god shows up and he forgives them
meanwhile
jonah is sitting up on a hill waiting
for the judgment of god to come on this
city
and uh and he’s he’s angry that god
forgives him
and you know i’ll let you read the story
but he’s angry because god showed mercy
he said this is why i didn’t want to do
it
that’s why i didn’t want to do because i
knew you’d just have mercy on him
because somehow it’d make him look bad
announcing judgment i guess and it not
happening
a lot of ministry gets perverted when we
are more concerned about how we appear
than how we reveal god
and so jonah in this situation he’s
bummed out he’s sitting on a hill
and a weird thing happens he’s got the
son just baking him
and he’s waiting for judgment it doesn’t
happen a plant grows up
overnight and it’s shade for him and the
next day
that plant dies at night here’s
here’s here’s what it says let me just
read these scriptures to you
it says uh when god saw their deeds
this is in um oh goodness i thought i
wrote down i didn’t write down the
reference
it’s in the bible oh it’s here it is
it’s in john 3
chapter 3 verse 10 when god saw their
deeds that they had turned from their
wicked ways now
please understand confession must
include
turning from and turning towards
that’s the concept of scripture hebrews
6 says repentance from dead works faith
towards god so there’s a from and
there’s a towards
he saw their deeds they turned from
their wicked ways then god relented
concerning the calamity which he had
declared he would bring
upon them and he did not do it
and so in the next uh the next passage
which is in chapter 4
verses 10 and 11 of jonah says then the
lord said now
the lord is rebuking jonah and you’ve
got to catch this part
the lord said you had compassion on the
plant
for which you did not work and did not
cause to grow which came up overnight
and perished overnight
should i not have compassion on nineveh
the great city in which there are more
than 120
000 persons who do not know the
difference between their right hand
and their left as well as many animals
this is a bizarre passage i want you to
catch this
jonah is shaded by a plant he goes to
sleep that night
the thing dies as quickly as it grew it
was he was being protected
god interprets that not as
oh you’re mad you don’t have shade
anymore god interprets it as
you had more compassion for a plant
that died in your presence than you do
for a city of people who are so
morally ethically twisted
that they spiritually speaking don’t
know the difference from the right hand
to their left they couldn’t find
themselves
their way out of a wet paper bag they
are so lost in their moral condition
that they couldn’t find their way into a
place of sanity
unless the mercy of god came upon them
so god announces
jonah your issue is the absence of
compassion
the absence of compassion so here’s this
story about nineveh
we see uh sodom and gomorrah were
destroyed
and um because of their sin god
announced he was going to bring
destruction on nineveh
and he did not why because he had
compassion now here’s the
here’s the deal that concerns me
jonah was fine with the compassion of
the lord
when it was for him he ran from god
swallowed by fish puked up on the land
and he was great with the compassion of
the lord when it was directed towards
him
but he was not happy with the compassion
of the lord
when it was directed towards those jonah
wanted to see judge for their sin
i see this i see this in in christianity
i see this in our world
where people will love the standard of
mercy when it’s extended to them but
they get very
frustrated when that standard of mercy
is extended towards others
it’s it’s it’s a blind spot it’s
actually a blind spot
it’s a blind spot that almo it’s almost
like it says
my deep repentance earned me that mercy
but i don’t believe they’ve deeply
repented it’s the judgment of the heart
and the judgment of the heart of another
person is one of the most
out of the line activities a believer
can be involved in because the scripture
says
no one can know the heart unless god
reveal it and he doesn’t reveal the
heart of another person
to you if you’re going to criticize them
he only gives revelation to those he can
trust with what he shows them
you cannot know your own heart how in
the world you’re going to know somebody
else’s
and when this this kind of stuff happens
somebody extends mercy extends kindness
uh i’m so i’m so thankful you were
patient with me i’m so thankful you were
kind
to me but when that same kindness is
shown to somebody else
it’s considered careless just no
standards
i remember we had a fallen
leader come to one of our events we’ve
had it several times but
i’m thinking of one in particular and
when he came
i introduced him to the crowd because
everybody everybody knows
everybody knows just his stupid mistakes
stupid sins
no excuse but there is forgiveness
when i introduced him he got a standing
ovation
which i interpreted as we forgive you
we accept you we want to give you room
to repent and deal with your stuff
but the critics in the room took as an
indication
that we were soft on sin
i’m guessing that was jonah’s thought
towards god you’re soft on sin these
people deserve
judgment
there’s not very many things that i
could emphasize today
that would be more pertinent to the hour
that we live in
than this right here
the mercy i’ve received i
must give away i must give away
the man who is forgiven of a great great
uh i forget the numbers now but you know
he owes millions of dollars and the guy
forgave him and then he turned and he
was angry at somebody who owed him
twenty dollars and
the man who had forgiven him millions
took back his forgiveness and brought
judgment on him
the only part i want to say is when
you’ve received
something i would like to suggest you
jonah
the prophet of the lord who knows the
voice of the lord who knows the presence
of the lord
who ran from god in that moment created
a bigger sin
than nineveh who didn’t know their right
hand from their left
and when god extended mercy to jonah the
man of god who fled from his presence
unwilling to do his will
that was the greater sin at least in my
thinking
than a city that didn’t even know how
lost they were
i i don’t want to you know put graduated
levels of sin i just want to say
god had mercy on the greater sin and the
problem
is when when you are raised in a church
environment when you grow up in this
kind of environment
which many of you are watching have been
we we deal lightly
with our sins of jealousy
our sins that accuse and point
our sins of easily being offended we
deal
lightly with those and are so
harsh towards those who have the
quote-unquote greater sins
the moral failures etc and
this is this is a time
as we come into a holiday season to
celebrate the gift
of god’s mercy in jesus this is a time
when it would be really smart for every
one of us to realize
i didn’t deserve it i didn’t deserve it
i remember i was in another city doing a
conference and
this pastor and all were leaving to go
out to lunch and there was a woman still
standing there
she was the only one left at the altar
praying
pastor said ask if i take a moment so i
went over and i began to pray so it’s a
long story i’m just going to cut it
short
she basically didn’t want me to pray for
him which is fine for me because i was
hungry for lunch i wanted to go with the
pastor but
but i i had this compassion thing that
stirred up on me that
that was at a different level it really
was it’s outside of my norm
she didn’t want me to pray for her she
wanted her husband to pray for it which
generally i just tell somebody you know
i have no problem with that i don’t have
to be the one and we’ll just move on
and then as i started to pray for her
anyway because i felt i’m supposed to
i said do you need to forgive anyone and
she said you don’t know what they’ve
done for me i go oh
super so now i got someone who doesn’t
want me to pray for him number one
number two
they are bitter and they they’re
unwilling to forgive
and she was absolutely unwilling to
forgive
now 99.9 of the time when i’m faced with
that i just i basically say listen
you’ll have to
you’ll have to work this out because
there’s no freedom for you until you
forgive
but that compassion thing stirred up
again and it was operating outside of
my my norm the way i would normally
think i i need i need
her to face the difficulty of her choice
to live in unforgiveness
that this calamity that she is facing is
connected to
but it rose up in me again and i
bypassed all my rules my personal
boundaries i bypassed all of them
i put my hand on her uh the shoulder
that was injured
and i just began to pray very simply i
said all right now move it around
she moved first of all she was
completely healed as she began to move
she broke into sobbing fell to her knees
and said i didn’t deserve it
i didn’t deserve it and that’s what we
need right now is a whole bunch of i
didn’t deserve it
stuff going on i just didn’t
deserve it and repentance
happened before me on the floor because
i was
in some way i was willing to move beyond
my my prescribed boundaries that are
biblically based
and follow compassion to her compassion
would lead me
she was healed and she repented
of the resentment
my mind turned quickly to matthew
and there’s a portion of scripture i’ve
taught on a number of times a number of
you
i’m sure you’ve heard me teach on out of
matthew chapter 11
and matthew chapter 12 and if
if i had this to do ever again i might
spend the entire time
just in matthew 11 and 12.
but in this chapter jesus talks about
three cities
and i’ll read it to you quickly jesus
says in matthew 11
21 what are you chores and what do you
bet say that if the miracles had
occurred entire in sidon
which occurred in you they would have
repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes
nevertheless i say to you be more
tolerable for tyron’s side
in the day of judgment than for you and
you capernaum
will not be exalted to heaven will you
uh
new king james says you are exalted to
heaven so
there are heaven-like in atmosphere you
will descend to hades for the miracles
had occurred in sodom which occurred in
you
it would have remained to this day now
hear this sodom
i said we’re talking about sodom
gomorrah in nineveh nineveh was spared
here jesus gives an insight as to how
even
the perverted horrible
twisted distorted city of sodom and
gomorrah could have been spared
and he says if the miracles that were
done in you capernaum
the religious community that is
comfortable
in living in biblical parameters
but you don’t move in repentance you
don’t move into a place where you
recognize
what god is doing is the only thing
worth being involved in
you just add him to your nice christian
lifestyle
and he says if the miracles that were
done in eucapan were done
in sodom sodom would still be here
what does that tell us it tells us
there’s something
about i want to say it’s the miracles i
want to say it’s the
abrupt invasion of the god of the
impossible coming into people’s lives it
is that
and more but let me suggest
that the miracles of jesus
all came from that place called
compassion
let’s re re-step this aware
the spirit of the lord god is upon me
why
to redeem to bring healing to restore
now he steps into a place where there’s
great need and he ministers
out of what he has what brought the
release
the compassion and jesus was moved with
compassion
and the person’s eyes were opened or the
lame walked whatever it might be
at a time that we live in right now
where
emotions are at a heightened uh area
level for everything it’s it’s
i’ve never seen a time when people are
more easily
and offended tell you the scary thing
about a fence and i i uh
i have to examine this in my own heart
in my own life right now
i’m aware that when you discern
something in somebody else
it’s often because it exists in you and
you’re not willing to recognize it
the spirit of offense
deadens a person’s ability
to discern while at the same time
heightening their awareness for the need
of discernment
offense clouds perverts distorts
a person’s ability to discern
what’s happening in another person if i
move with offense
i will misread and misdiagnose most
every relationship i’m in
if i’m governed by offense my own
ability to discern
but what’s crazy is my passion for
discernment increases and i don’t know
where i’m blind
and because i don’t know where i’m blind
and the passion for discernment
it means that my discernment now is
misdiagnosed
and uh and usually brings destruction
and not clarity not liberty not freedom
it is good
this past passage in matthew 11
jesus gives the insight to how senfield
cities can be
turned it’s through miracle signs and
wonders
specifically it’s the release of
compassion
that brings a company of people to the
streets
that know what they have and every
hundred dollar bill they give away
so to speak is immediately replaced
because the spirit is given to us
without measure
one more passage i want to read to you
it’s
this is typically what i refer to
it’s the very next chapter matthew
chapter 12.
in this chapter a paralytic is healed
then a crowd gathers everyone in the
crowd is healed
then a blind and mute man is brought to
jesus
and he is healed and then it says
in verse 38 then some of the scribes and
pharisees said to him teacher
we want to see a sign from you
it’s one of the weirdest stories
sequence of stories in the bible for me
miracle miracle miracle
we want to see a sign from you then we
want to see a sign from you
what’s the point
the war is between signs that come from
compassion
and signs that elevate my own esteem and
my own sense of control
the pharisees as always want to dictate
what happens and they want jesus to
perform tricks for them
when jesus refused to perform for them
especially since he had just done these
series of miracles
that brought healing deliverance to
people and they went unrecognized
by the pharisaical crowd
what’s the point they were not moved
with compassion they
are in the exact place as sodom gomorrah
was
in that time of judgment because they
didn’t use their
surplus towards serving
and helping and redeeming
so here’s this verse is used often
against those of us who pray for the
sick
jesus answered and said to this group he
says an evil and adulterous
generation craves for a sign no sign
will be given but the sign of jonah the
prophet
it is an absolute abuse of scripture
the heart and the context of scripture
to assume that jesus is rebuking people
that are pursuing miracles it’s an
absolute abuse it’s in the context
it’s a violation of reason
what he refused to do is put them in
charge where they could dictate
the showmanship of the hour
and instead he withheld and he said this
he said no sign will be given to you
that’s very specific group of people you
will not receive any sign except the
sign of jonah i’ve always thought
three days in the belly of the fish come
out the resurrection was the sign
and it may be but in my reading today
it stood out to me
that jesus followed this statement with
verse 41
and he said the men of nineveh will
stand up with this generation at the
judgment
and will condemn it because they
repented at the preaching of jonah
and behold something greater than jonah
is here
what’s the sign of jonah i’m wondering
if it’s not the absolute raw
preaching of the gospel of jesus christ
the raw preaching where god himself
shows up he puts his hand on a message
that releases the opportunity for the
transformation of a life
if it might not be that this group of
people will not see miracles anymore
all they will have is the opportunity to
repent because they have heard a message
that comes forth with the force and the
power of heaven to transform a life
there’s something unmistakable in this
message that jesus brought to people
unmistakable in that he always provides
people
a way to enter life and to avoid uh
damnation credit uh a condemnation
tragedy he gives access
to life to breakthrough to becoming all
that god designed
for us to become all of his disciplines
none of them are for punishment
the always to refine our focus so that
we enter more fully into life enter more
fully into who we were designed to be
i believe that the testimony of
scripture
is that we have a sense of indebtedness
as believers
number one to get to be to get filled
with the spirit of god until we are
conscious
of what we have silver and gold have i
none but here’s what i do have
get up out of the wheelchair and walk
the burning conviction that what i have
is greater than the problem you have
and i’m going to make an exchange with
or i’m going to give you a gift
it’s a bizarre situation
that what the lord is looking for is for
you for me to number one
become aware of the god who is with us
emmanuel
god with us number two allow his heart
to bring us to that place of compassion
yieldedness
so that the gifts of the spirit move in
the context of love
not in showmanship not in we want a
bigger crowd not
any of that stuff it’s the simple gospel
that changes a person’s life the
greatest miracle is the conversion of a
soul
the greatest miracle but it does not
stop there is to heal the bodies to
bring deliverance
from the torment that exists on the mind
on the family line
all these things were to be dealt with
with the gospel of power
and that’s what you have that’s what i
have is a gospel
of power it is unlimited in its scope
in its measure in its ability
to not only restore everyone watching
this to a place of
friendship with god restored as a child
to a loving father
but also to the point where he heals our
land
and right now we need the healing of the
land
i’m going to close in prayer but i want
to ask all of you that are watching
if you find yourself outside of a
personal relationship with jesus christ
then i want you on the bethel tv on
youtube channel
podcast whatever means you are
by which you are watching this broadcast
let somebody know
i need i want to know jesus
i want to know jesus somebody will pray
with you they’ll talk with you pray with
you
let me just close the prayer father
i thank you that we actually are on the
edge
of what could be the greatest
reformation in all of history
all of history we acknowledge that that
is
the purpose of the gospel is to
transform a life
a family a nation a world
and i’m asking that in this season
regardless of the abundance in our life
in the season or the lack
that we would never lack compassion and
that you would flow in and through us
to bring healing to the land i pray this
in jesus name
amen amen bless you