Hosting the Presence

by Bill Johnson

  Having said this, I sure hope we will soon come to a day when this nonsense of tolerating sin stops for us. To make up for this weakness in the body, many have taught that character is more important than power. I taught this myself for many years. We have devastating stories to prove our point. Our stories are missing one minor detail: Jesus didn’t teach or practice it that way. In fact, when Jesus gave power and authority to His disciples in Luke 9, it was immediately followed by some of their biggest blunders. Right after the disciples received this impartation, they are found rejecting other followers of Jesus—exclusivity had poisoned their hearts. Previous to this, they spent considerable time arguing who was better than the other. They had just returned from ministry to their hometowns. It stands to reason that their success in power ministry had given each of them all the evidence needed to prove their points—they were the greatest! James and John topped it off by wanting to kill an entire city of Samaritans by calling down fire on them. The spirit of murder was unrecognized by them, all in the name of ministry and discernment. All of these huge blemishes came to light after the glorious moment when Jesus entrusted them with power and authority. Their character was seriously flawed. The greatest part of this mystery is that He followed what we might call a failed experiment in chapter 9 by releasing the same anointing over 70 others in Luke chapter 10. He entrusted power to people who were far from qualified to walk in extraordinary anointing. Sometimes true character can only be formed in the trenches of warfare and life.

  Two Are Better Than One

  It is true that power is not more important than character. But it is equally true that character is not more important than power. Whenever we make that mistake, the gifts of the Spirit become rewards and are no longer gifts. This emphasis has actually damaged our effectiveness in the gifts of the Spirit. In fact, this approach has caused as much damage in the area of supernatural gifting as flawed character has damaged our witness to the world. Both are essential. Character and power are the two legs we stand on, equal in importance.

  For every gifted person without character, I can show you many people with character who have little power. That has been the focus of the church in my generation in most parts of the world. A lifestyle without power has been considered normal. As a result, they are making little difference in the world around them. We must stop grading on the curve, where our approval comes from fitting in to the accepted standard. We must return to Jesus Christ—perfect theology, the ultimate example of the gifts of the Spirit working in the context of the fruits of the Spirit: character and power.

  It is interesting to note that the groups of people who walk in little power are much more inclined to believe that the church is going to get weaker and weaker before the end of time comes. They are prone to a view of the last days where very few will actually endure to the end. This perspective seems to legitimize their powerlessness, giving it a purpose. It’s ridiculous.

  On the other hand, those who walk in power see the desperate condition of the world, but also see the world’s openness to God when the impossibilities of their lives yield to the name of Jesus through our lips. When the church discovers who she is, she no longer wants to be rescued. There’s a big difference between rescued from the big bad devil and being taken up for a wedding. And only one is acceptable for a believing believer.

  We are able to maintain our focus by valuing the heart of God. It was King David’s strength.

  Returning to the Gold Standard

  The secret of the ministry of Jesus is in the relationship He has with His Father. His primary mission was to reveal Him by displaying His nature and His will. Jesus is the will of God. In doing so, He made startling statements like: “The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do…the Son also does in like manner” (John 5:19) and “I speak to the world those things which I heard from Him” (John 8:26). Jesus put Heaven on a collision course with the orphaned planet called earth. His dependence upon the Father brought forth the reality of His world into this one. This is how He could say, “The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!”

  All the acts of Jesus were expressions of His Father for all humanity to see. Previous to this all humankind saw the devastating nature of sin, and the consequences for such actions. But Jesus came and furnished the one missing element—the Father. The writer of Hebrews called Jesus the exact representation of His Father’s nature (see Heb. 1:3). The life of Jesus is the most complete and accurate revelation of the Father ever seen in this world. Jesus said, “If you’ve seen me you’ve seen my Father” (John 14:9). It is still true. It is the heart of this perfect Father to give life to humankind (see John 10:10) and destroy all the works of the destroyer (see 1 John 3:8). The Holy Spirit is the one who reveals the heart of the Father to and through us (see John 16:12-15).

  The Father’s Business

  Some things that were so practical for Jesus have become so very abstract to us. This ought not to be. Doing only what the Father is doing is one of the more important areas of life that has been crippled by this tendency to over spiritualize what was quite natural. The following are a few of the ways that I have been able to begin to experience and understand as ways to know what the Father is doing. (Perhaps our bracelets should be changed from WWJD to WIFD—what is Father doing.)

  Direct word: There is little doubt that Jesus heard directly from the Father about what He wanted Jesus to do in a particular situation. My personal belief is that much of that direction came in the nights Jesus spent in prayer that preceded the days of ministry. But it is also true that the Holy Spirit who always rested upon Him revealed in the moment what the Father wanted from Him. Learning the many ways that God speaks helps us to be more in tune with this possibility.

  Seeing faith in another: One of the more encouraging possibilities that Jesus displayed is the fact that He didn’t always seem to know what to do ahead of time, but got His direction by seeing faith in another person. To me, this means that sometimes I can receive direction by seeing the heart response of another to the Holy Spirit’s work in them. Faith can exist in a person only through the work of God. So it stands to reason that I can see what the Father is doing by observing the faith in others. But if I’m not familiar with the realm of faith in me, it will be harder to see it in another. The centurion is a great example of this. Jesus was stunned by the faith he saw in that man and responded to his request by releasing the word to heal his servant. “Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled and said to those who were following, ‘Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel’” (Matt. 8:10). Jesus released the reality of the Kingdom to this man according to his faith. “And Jesus said to the centurion, ‘Go; it shall be done for you as you have believed.’ And the servant was healed that very moment” (Matt. 8:13).

  Using our own faith: Often we are unclear as to the specific will of God in a situation. The direction of the Father is not always clear to me. In these situations, it is possible to find the will of God through our own faith as we respond to the revealed will of God in His Word. We sometimes make the mistake of hoping God will come to us and make things clear, when it rests upon us to activate faith and pursue. Many get paralyzed in ministry through their own inactivity. Again, much of what we need in life will be brought to us, but much of what we hunger for will have to be pursued. Abiding faith pursues the will of God until it is found. We will always fall short in this miracle realm if we only respond to the things that become perfectly clear. Some of the greatest breakthroughs I’ve ever seen came as we responded to a slight impression or an idea of what God might be doing. Our own faith will take us into the discovery of what the Father is doing.

  The Outcome

  John the Baptist saw the dove come upon Jesus and remain. There is no record of anyone else seeing the dove. Yet everyone saw the result of the dove’s presence: both in purity and power, displayed to reveal the heart of God for this orphaned planet.

  As the Holy Spirit revealed the F
ather’s will to Jesus, so He reveals the Father’s heart to us. And His Presence and power reveal the Father through us. Revealing His will is revealing Him.

  Jesus became the ultimate revelation of the will of God on earth. But it’s not just through what He accomplished. It is through His relentless and consistent hosting of the Dove.

  Giving place to the Presence of God as our greatest joy and treasure is not a trick we use to get miracles. But the Father cannot be adequately represented without miracles. They are essential in revealing His nature.

  We make the distinction between the natural and the supernatural. Those are the two realms we live in. But God only has one realm: the natural. It’s all natural for Him.

  9

  Releasing the Dove

  It’s hard to put into words how moved I am by the story of the Holy Spirit resting upon Jesus like a dove—and remaining. A holy jealousy gets stirred up in me: a jealousy to live in the reality that Jesus lived in. Seeing what is possible through His example has freed me to hunger for what I know is within reach. It has been a growing experience for the last many years, one that continues to progress. Hunger prevails.

  Jesus doesn’t always tell us what to pursue. Some things only become a part of our lives because we see the ways of God and pursue accordingly. Earlier in this book, I discussed this reality in another context: Jesus didn’t teach people to touch His clothing to get well. They observed the nature of God working through Him and responded to what they saw that was available through that example. We can now use the same principle to see what Jesus carried continuously that really set the precedent for how each of us is to live.

  We do well to pursue according to His commands. But romance is no longer romance when it is commanded. Some things must be pursued only because they are there. Moses was able to distill the cry of his heart in this simple prayer: “Let me know Your ways that I may know You” (Exod. 33:13). Discovering His ways is the invitation to come to Him and know Him in the way revealed. Revelations of His nature are invitations to experience Him. As He reveals His nature to us through the moving of the Holy Spirit, He will often leave us without command. Instead, He longs to discover what is actually in our hearts, as it is in the nature of the heart in love to always respond to the open door for encounter.

  The Dove and the Disciples

  The Holy Spirit couldn’t live in the disciples until they were born again, which couldn’t happen until Jesus had died and was raised from the dead. But even though the Spirit of God wasn’t in the twelve, He was with the twelve.

  …The Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you (John 14:17).

  He said to them: you know Him. This is amazing to me as they were not yet born again. They had a measure of relationship with the Holy Spirit before they were born again.

  Sometimes you don’t get to know a person until you work with them. That is certainly the setting Jesus created for His disciples. They were to develop a relationship with the Holy Spirit in ministry that would later set them up for the most amazing promotion imaginable: they would become the dwelling place of God on earth.

  Jesus was the perfect teacher. His time with the twelve was critical for many reasons. One reason is that during those times He gave practical instruction for the rest of their lives. Both by His instruction and His example He revealed the priority of this wonderful adventure with God the Holy Spirit. But in all honestly, some of Jesus’ instruction seems extremely abstract to me and somewhat hard to understand.

  Sometimes lessons seem impractical to us because we live in a different atmosphere than when the lesson was given. Having Jesus illustrate how to protect the Presence of the dove, for example, is much more practical when the evidence of that Presence is witnessed moment by moment by the disciples for over three years. When we grow up in an environment where little Presence is displayed, we don’t always understand what Jesus taught. The atmosphere created by His manifest Presence and lifestyle contributes amazingly to a lesson being given. Having said that, we are in a season of increased Presence and power: all of this is changing for us. And I’m thankful. As a result, some of the things that have been hidden from us in the Scriptures are now being revealed because we have a place to put them.

  Ready or Not, Here We Come

  After giving a commission to the 70 disciples, Jesus sent them out in pairs to their hometowns. Interestingly, He considered them to be fully prepared. If truth be told, in most of our churches this group of unqualified people wouldn’t be allowed to be ushers or to direct traffic, let alone head up evangelistic campaigns. (I’m of the opinion that we often over train our people until they become spiritually muscle bound.) He sent them out, saying

  Carry neither moneybag, knapsack, nor sandals; and greet no one along the road. But whatever house you enter, first say, “Peace to this house.” And if a son of peace is there, your peace will rest on it; if not, it will return to you (Luke 10:4).

  First of all, notice He sent them out without provisions. No money, no hotel reservations, no rented auditoriums, nothing—just a geographical direction and a shove. One of the things I tried to do for my children is to take care of every possible problem ahead of time so they would be successful. Jesus didn’t. He intentionally sent them in over their heads. They stepped into situations where they would need each other (sent out in pairs) and they would need to discover the direction of the Spirit of God, as a team. The goal wasn’t for them to have powerful meetings at home, even though they did. The goal was for them to learn to work with the Holy Spirit, who was with them. Jesus was interested in connecting them to the process of hosting the Presence more than He was interested in the outcome of meetings. He was raising up a company of people upon whom the Holy Spirit could also rest and remain.

  Many of the lessons we need to learn can only be learned in serving others. The end result was they had powerful meetings at home, which is the most difficult place to be successful in ministry. As Jesus had already noted, “Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown” (Luke 4:24). One of the reasons it’s so important to learn ministry at home is because of the value of serving where there is no honor. We must not become addicted to the praises of men. If we don’t live by their praises, we’ll not die by their criticisms. But this was only possible if they first learned the place of the Holy Spirit in the endeavor.

  The second thing to take note of is what Jesus told them to do once they found a place to stay. They were to let their peace come upon that household. Is that merely a command to greet people with the word shalom? I doubt it. That lesson could have been taught with much less fanfare. I personally don’t believe they really understood this instruction until later in their story. Regardless, they were to release peace, and then interestingly take it back if there was no one there who was worthy (see Matt. 10:13). Luke’s Gospel reads that peace would automatically come back to them.

  Peace, the Person

  The world thinks of peace as the absence of something: a time without war, a time without noise, or a time without conflict. For a believer, Peace is a person—the presence of someone. Our ability to respond to this command of Jesus to release peace over a household is central in His instruction for ministry. It is tied directly to our ability to recognize the Presence of the Holy Spirit. It’s hard to release with any consistency what you’re not aware of. Consciousness of Presence will always increase our impact when it comes to influencing the world around us.

  So much of what we do is done out of ministry principles instead of out of the Presence. One of the mysteries of life is that a primary role of a believer is the stewardship of a person, the Abiding Presence, who is the Holy Spirit—the dove that remains. He is a person, not an it. When we reduce the joy of knowing God to the principles that bring breakthrough, we cheapen the journey. Those who desire principles above Presence seek a kingdom without a king.

  Jesus is
called the Prince of Peace in Scripture. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Christ, the person of peace. And that Peace that is a person is the actual atmosphere of Heaven. That is why peace is like a double-edged sword: it is calming and wonderful for the believer, but highly destructive and invasive for the powers of darkness. “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet” (Rom. 16:20). That’s quite an assignment given to His followers: release the person of peace when you enter a home, for in doing so, you will release the Presence that is the actual atmosphere of Heaven to yielded hearts while at the same time undermining the powers of darkness that are at work in that home. For that atmosphere is expressed through the person of the Holy Spirit. For Jesus, this was Ministry 101.

  What God Longs For

  For God, miracles are as simple as breathing. No effort is required. Because the Spirit of the resurrected Christ lives within us, miracles are expected. But that is not where His desires are focused for us. He wants our hearts. And while there are many expressions of a surrendered heart, He looks for those who will trust Him. Remember, without faith it is impossible to please Him (see Heb. 11:6). Trust is the issue.