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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Bill Johnson
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October 19, 2021 - January 14, 2022
God is looking for people who will actually get to know each other and give their lives for one another. Partnerships in life are essential. Longevity is essential. That’s where we learn to help to partner with each other’s dreams.
Ugh
both Pharaoh and Joseph had dreams
neither could reach the fulfillment of their dream without the other. It wasn’t until Joseph served the dream of an ungodly king that God fulfilled his own. This is amazing. It’s a unique call to serve the dream of another. It’s what friends, family, and partners do. For when one of us gets a breakthrough, it causes a domino effect for the rest of us. One person’s victory is the victory of us all. Thinking like members of a body will help give us perspective on how this Kingdom works and how it can be successfully released into our churches and communities.
I need to join in the dream of others. Yes?
would find whatever person I questioned and look at their picture until I felt the pleasure of the Lord for them. His pleasure for people is usually experienced in my heart as compassion and honor for them. It comes up from the very center of my being, where the Holy Spirit lives.
Practice this, SummerLee.
Sensing God’s heart for others keeps us from a typical religious response and brings us into a connection with His love for people.
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68 NKJV). To me Peter was saying, “We don’t understand Your message about eating Your flesh or drinking Your blood any more than the crowd that left. But what we do know is that whenever You speak, we come alive inside.”
This story reveals the greatest risk in ministry I can find. The reward for this risk was the next time Jesus came back to that region, every person from every city showed up to hear Him speak.
Look this up.
Jesus never rebuked them for thinking themselves great. Everyone who spent time with Jesus began to dream of significance. And yet it was their understanding of greatness that was in error. Not the desire. Jesus pruned their understanding back to His perspective. The least is the greatest. The servant of all is the greatest. The child is the greatest. They got it.
in the Kingdom, loyalty to one never requires disloyalty to another. It’s not a competition against one another. It’s a race against time.
Jesus pruned back their understanding of loyalty to a place that would grow fruit for the Kingdom when He said, “Do not hinder him; for he who is not against you is for you” (Luke 9:50). This
It should become apparent that Jesus is not quite as nervous about messes as most of us are.
look at what moves Him—co-laborers who work to represent Him well by bringing freedom to captives and healing to those in need. Also
It's about people.
Believe in people before they earn
When God is number one, there is no number two.
Every area of my life must be part of my worship of God Himself. If there’s a part of my life that cannot be an expression of my love for God, it shouldn’t be in my life.
Ohboy...
Amen.
Something happens when you realize that what you’re doing brings pleasure to His heart. Our personal esteem and confidence grow dramatically.
when we serve and love people, He takes it personally. It’s as though He is in the room and it was Him we served. It seems to me that if we better understand His delight in the things we do for others, our awareness of His heart will grow exponentially. It is possible to serve people and not really love God. That’s the whole point of 1 Corinthians 13. But it’s impossible to really love God and not love and serve people. And the beauty is, we don’t honor people separate from God but instead unto God.
Merely offering our efforts unto Him sanctifies that which was previously thought to be secular, vain, or mundane. I was able to see that every part of my life was sanctified by its eternal purpose.
Offer your bus driving to Him, SummerLee. Yes, I can see how this takes the fear of failing to pray over a situation or person away. I offer the whole thing to You as worship and invite You to sanctify it.
The moment all of us are waiting for is when He says, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matt. 25:23). I realize this is speaking of a future event. But He breathes that into our heart every time we know with confidence that we have done the will of God. Doing what brings Him pleasure, whether it’s preaching, praying for the sick, or going on a picnic with my family, delights the heart of our Father who takes it personally. It’s the manner in which we do what we do. Laying hands on the sick, or working in the garden, or even going to a Little League game all become spiritual activities
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Obedience is one of the ways He gives strength to His people. Jesus put it this way: “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work” (John 4:34). The will of God nourishes the soul in the same way that healthy food nourishes the body bringing it great strength.
Memorize this verse, Summer.
Living conscious of His delight in the simple things in life is key to a godly self-esteem. In turn we are able to live in the strength intended from eating this heavenly meal called obedience.
Live in the strength intended (offered, available, meant for me/us) from this Heavenly meal.
Obedience is a meal.
It is said that 95 percent of the money that comes into the American Church is spent on itself.
This is what RV is unhappy about.
That which we gave to Him becomes supernaturally effective because it was placed into His hands as a gift.
It fed my soul in ways that are nearly impossible to describe. Oftentimes, I would not have been able to explain what I had just read, as it hadn’t touched my mind yet. My heart was always moved to greater surrender, a deeper sense of awe for who He is, and greater hunger for Him and His Word. My mind would eventually catch up.
Yup!
Learning to give according to His heart is always beyond what my mind would lead me to. So faith was essential. This is where I learned that “faith comes by hearing”
The lifestyle of generosity must be taught and modeled.
I'm a poor example.
give gifts to my family members on my birthday.
Oh yes! I'm in!
I only have one life to live. Which means I only have one lifetime to reveal what our heavenly Father is like. “God so loved the world, that He gave” (John 3:16).
We have to make sure that we require ourselves to think bigger than we find to be comfortable. God has not called us to do what is humanly possible or reasonable. We are children of a King who knows no impossibility. And He longs for His heart to become ours.
those who reach out to the nations through giving, love, and care will always have enough to meet the needs of those in their own circle of influence.
We started late-night prayer meetings every Friday night. We always spent an hour or so in worship and then prayed for our city. And sometime during that second hour we’d pick a nation to pray for.
Would I commit to this on Friday nights? It would definitely interfere with my entertainment agenda.
Andx then for upwards of two hours to boot.
Abba, change my priorities.
Soon the spirit of prayer would come upon us as we’d pray for our city and then for a nation.
What does this mean?
Values practiced over time become culture.
The thought of living for a group of people they’d probably never see in this lifetime was a new and scary concept. But it is totally Kingdom in its nature. And when embraced, it helps define the nature of the culture you live in and impart.
Do what’s in your heart, and do it as unto the Lord. But from that position, think of the significance of your role as God breathes on your labor and station in life. What could happen? Dream and obey to find out what might be possible in your lifetime.
Dream and obey as God breathes on your labor. With this type of attitude ANY job becomes full of eternal opportunity. Practice this prayer, SummerLee.
As soon as someone on our staff gets breakthrough in an area,
Again, huh?
Heaven has the ultimate culture of abundance. It is not only a place of “more than enough”; it is a place of extravagance and extremes. Learning about His world and how this knowledge is to affect our attitudes and expectations is an important part of the “on earth as it is in heaven” mandate.
Live, give and love extravagantly
Many believers don’t actually know how to live life in a practical way. They understand church attendance, serving in a ministry, and other essentials of that nature, but they really don’t know how practical God is.
co-laboring with God. As we work, He breathes on our labor and the natural becomes supernaturally productive in ways that bless us and glorify Him.
The direction for our lives is simple but important.
Cultivating a heart that values leaders regardless of how little godliness is in their lives is a challenge, but with great reward. Being thankful for them before they deserve it qualifies them for a visitation of God in a most remarkable way.
I believe obedience in this area comes with great reward.
What does it mean that it "qualifies" them for a special visitation? Is that scriptural?
His purpose for our wellbeing would be without disturbance and interruption.
What a profound outcome for those praying for their leaders.
If we can celebrate simplicity, God can trust us with the complex because we won’t be impressed or controlled
The ordinary, when cared for as unto the Lord, is the school for the extraordinary.
He is the God of beauty and design and has called us into the co-laboring role to put our mark on what He has made. Just as Adam gave names to all the animals, so God has invited us into a relational role of creativity, enhancing the beauty of His creation.
Many people want to do the right thing, but they carry a pressure connected to the opinions of others. It’s not that a calloused heart is the answer, as we’re to value the good counsel. But there is a fear of man that poisons many people’s ability to be bold and obey God. They find it difficult to choose the right thing because of this pressure. Jesus addressed this issue as it pertains to our faith. “How can you believe, when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God?” (John 5:44). Our faith is compromised anytime we look for the
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Conversely, the healthy soul knows the value of godly counsel and knows how to benefit from the courage of others.
Whenever we are burdened with worry or anxiety, we are less likely to think with fresh creative solutions and less likely to join in the divine adventure offered to us.
Adventure!
Knowing we are forgiven, and forgiving ourselves, is key to healthy emotions.
