Bill Johnson · Bethel Church · Preached May 11, 2014 · Published January 16, 2026
0:00 But I want to challenge every believer. There is a miracle that God has been planning eternity past. Something impossible. Something that can only be brought forth in its purest form through you. It can't be done by someone else. And the world is crying for it. They're looking for the expression of Jesus in and through you. Thank you. We hugged more people than is comprehensible.
0:59 And I just got warmed up. Chris is worn out. My hugger is still working very well. I'm a professional hugger. So I don't do it for occasional entertainment. I do it as a professional. Thank you, Chris. Thank you. No complaints. No complaints for me. No sir. Hugs are good.
1:38 Knighting, though, I've decided my sword, I think it weighs about 50 pounds. Not quite. It's an exaggeration. but maybe twice as much as Chris's. I think I'm getting one of them plastic Burger King swords from next year. That's really good. I know we have a lot of family and friends of students here. It's great to have you here. We've got every, I think, three overflow rooms that are all packed to capacity, so. Glad you're here. Why don't you, let's see, we're going to do a couple things first, though. Let me get my bearings straight. I lost my little prop, though. It's all right. I can't work with it. I had a prop. Yes, I had a prop. Steve Backlund has a new book. Yes, no, it's not that. It's actually, oh, Paul is bringing it. How cool is that? Thank you.
2:30 What a guy. Thanks, Paul. Steve Backlund has a new book out, Crucial Moments. Paul, since you're on, or Tom, I'll have you do it. Just find this single mom, Crucial Moments. He'll be signing in the Hebrews lobby. Any single moms want this crucial. He's so good on getting perspective on life just shifted, and he's a real gift to us. Anyway, he'll be signing in the Hebrews lobby. And then we also have gifts for every mother.
3:02 Lip gloss. This will help you to preach the gospel with power. this is anointing your lips to preach with boldness I sure hope we have enough for all the overflow I guess you guys have taken care of that oh this is vanilla vanilla I never heard of that avocado, aloe, mango, butters, beeswax and flavoring Bethel Redding this is Bethel lip gloss so all the mothers put your hands up we want to make sure to give you Bethel lip gloss. I've never heard of such a thing. A church giving out lip gloss.
3:46 It says mom is a noun. Means hero. Blessed and highly favored. One that God smiles at. That works. Man, I might use this. I want to become a great woman of God before I die. It's one of my goals. Keep your hands up moms and they will So they will get this to you. We had a service in Sacramento years ago where they were knighting the women, doing a knighting ceremony. I think I got too close to the knighting ceremony. Got a woman's anointing that day. It was great. Did you know that Pentecost was the great equalizer? Before Pentecost, crowds were counted by the number of men, and it would say besides women and children.
4:40 But after Pentecost, it was 120 men and women. It was 5,000 men and women. They were always brought in equal from Pentecost on. The outpouring of the Spirit broke all the barriers. The class barrier, because bond servants were also anointed, men and women. Racial barriers. All the different nations and races. So all the barriers that people would set up to divide, Pentecost destroys. And the outpouring of the Spirit does that, and it's the great equalizer. And enables every woman to walk in full identity and authority. So we bless you. Declare that over you. and we're giving you lip gloss just to help.
5:29 I'm not sure. Yeah, your lips will be anointed with vanilla, vanilla, peppermint, and there's some others out there. All right, all the moms, why don't you stand? We're going to pray for you. You know what we're going to do on this one? I've not done it this way before, but everyone who wants to be a mother, we're going to pray for you as though you are. I want you to stand as well. We're going to pray for you as though you are. Yeah. There's an interesting verse. We're not going to have time for it today, so let me just throw it out in Isaiah 54. I realize some of you are not married, so you're standing for a husband and a baby. Others, you need a miracle. Hang on.
6:22 I've got this sorted out. I just don't want others to have to sort it, all right? I'm going to sort it for you. Others, it's impossible for you to have a child, and the Lord's going to do a miracle. We have countless numbers of miracles in this way, where people who can't, either because of the issue with the guy or the gal, the woman's closed, where there's the miracle, and the miracle of a child. So I believe by this time next year, we will see women with children that couldn't have children. And by this time next year, some who are not married, you will not be pregnant, but you will have a husband. So we've got things going in the right direction here. So all right. All right. Just got it. Occasionally we're in crowds where we actually have to put that in order. And I realize that most of you would know that order. All right. All right. We got folks standing. I want you to bless them. Here's what I want you to do. I want you to bless them with a prayer of fulfilled dreams and desires.
7:24 I feel like sometimes life gets so full and so hectic that we just kind of try to keep our head above water. I want them to enter into the bonus round right now. The bonus round. Are they going to enter into fulfillment of dreams, desires, wishes, and I want you to lay hands on them and pray. We've got some where there's just moms everywhere, so you can lay hands on each other. Just stand, pray for them really good. Call forth the fulfillment of dreams. yeah even awakened dreams that have have been long put aside even childhood dreams that were thought to be childish awaken the ones that you you designed you created them for we pray for this for the glory of god that god would be honored by the fulfillment of dreams of mothers, of moms-to-be, brides-to-be all across this room.
8:22 we pray for those watching on TV the same way. We pray for that real spirit of breakthrough to come and for there to be the release of blessing and fulfillment, absolute fulfillment of dreams, fulfillment of desires. We pray this in Jesus' wonderful name. Amen. You did good. Hug them, bless them, do something. And then go ahead and be seated. Beautiful. I want you to open your Bibles to Genesis chapter 18. And also to Hebrews 11. Genesis 18, Hebrews 11.
9:15 Let me talk at you for 25 minutes or so. it's not a secret that one of my most favorite subjects and certainly I think it would be the same for most of our team one of our most favorite subjects is the whole issue of promises from God I love it so much it's one thing I can say I live my life by this principle, by these standards and have worked hard to become strong in them.
10:00 The New Testament has a term for a lifestyle that we live as disciples of Jesus, and it's called the kingdom of God. It's called living in the kingdom. That's really what it is, because kingdom is king's domain, and being a disciple is that you literally live in the realm of his dominion. But the Old Testament prophetic picture or example of the kingdom was called the promised land. The promised land was never supposed to represent heaven. It was supposed to represent the normal life of a believer.
10:37 The promised land, a land obtained through promise. and the Lord has marked every one of our lives with promises that invite us into conquest. They invite us into the realms of impossibility. And the stories that are represented in scripture, I'm going to review a couple of them briefly in honor of Mother's Day, but in a very strange way, I'm hoping all of you will become pregnant as a result of today. I honestly, every person in this room has been designed by the Lord to give birth to something that's impossible. God has ideas. He puts them into words and he speaks them. And those words form inside the heart of surrendered individuals. And from that comes a demonstration of who Jesus is.
11:38 And I would never want to put on an equal level the birth of anything that you and I would, you know, anything that you and I would give birth to on an equal level with you know, the virgin birth of Jesus, the Messiah God eternal, taking on flesh while I would never want to put it on an equal plane, I will say in a very scary way, there's more similarities than you might be comfortable in imagining. Because the Lord wants to bring forth something out of every life, out of every heart, something that is absolutely impossible. We're going to look at an interesting story first in a series that I've been threatening to do for a while. I'm putting on hold again for just the dates aren't working out right for me. So I'm going to be dealing with Abraham a little bit in that story. But today is going to be Sarah. So I want you to go to verse 9 of Genesis 18.
12:38 We'll read a few verses here and then go to Hebrews 11. Verse 9, they said to him, they, literally, God showed up in the flesh, a theophanies, an appearance of the Lord in the Old Testament. With the angel or whoever, he decided to bring, where is Sarah your wife? He said, here in the tent. And he said, I will certainly return to you according to the time of life. And behold, Sarah, your wife, shall have a son. Sarah was listening in the tent door which was behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age, and Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I have grown old, shall I have pleasure, my Lord, being old also? And the Lord said to Abraham, Why did Sarah laugh, saying, shall I surely bear a child since I am old? Is anything too hard for the Lord?
13:39 At the appointed time, I will return to you according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son. But Sarah denied it, saying, I did not laugh, for she was afraid. And he said, no, but you did laugh. Got a couple problems with this story. One is Sarah laughed at God, and two, she lied. So we have some issues here. In Hebrews 11, we read the same story. It's a little bit different in Hebrews 11. Verse 11, by faith, Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged him faithful who had promised. Now that's the same story. It was just rewritten after repentance.
14:38 What story do you have that he rewrote after you turned to him? He doesn't hold on to the memory of past failures to bring up at an appropriate time to add weight to his story against you. This is his record. This is his personal diary of Sarah's life. Her picture hangs on his refrigerator, and this is the way he wrote the story. By faith, she received strength to conceive, bring forth a son, because she considered him faithful. I think New American Standard says since she considered him faithful. The word there for since, or in this case because, is actually translated because or when. So think of it this way. Sarah received strength when she considered him faithful.
15:34 Sarah received strength to conceive, bring forth a son, because or when she considered him faithful. Think about this. She had a role. The role was to think about his faithfulness. the power of the miracle is not in my efforts it's not in my sweat it's not even in my fasting should the lord lead me to fast the power is in the word that he speaks everything that we do is just to accommodate the word that he has spoken but the power is in the word that he said in this particular case the promise was brought forth that she would have a son and it says when or because she considered or thought about his faithfulness it was in that consideration dwelling on meditating on it was in that she received the ability to bring forth the son I love the fact that the Lord has rewritten all of our histories.
16:40 That's amazing to me. He's rewritten the story, and according to the way he wrote it, you look good. You're going to say, that's not the way I remember it. And he's going to say, your memory don't count. Sarah's advanced in age and she couldn't have a son. Hannah was of a ripe age, but she was barren and couldn't have a son. She travailed in prayer. She contended. She wept. She fought for, in a sense. In fact, she was so disheartened. It's in 1 Samuel 1. She was so disheartened by not having a son that she came before the Lord and wept so bitterly, the word is used, so bitterly that the priest actually thought she was drunk.
17:39 Thought she was out of her mind. And she responded to him, please don't think of your servant as drunk. And then began to explain the bitterness of soul. Something happened through her contending that enabled her to reverse the effects of barrenness and to become the mother of a son. And then there's the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus. she wasn't married. And I love the story so much. I talk about it often, so forgive me if it's repeat for you, but it's just one of the stories that baffles me. There are several that I just return to over and over and over again. This is one of them, John the Baptist, and the anointing that came upon Jesus is another that I got to review every couple months. But here's the one, the Gabriel appears to Mary and says, you're highly favored of the Lord, which is interesting because highly favored in heaven doesn't mean you're automatically highly favored on earth.
18:43 As Joseph was about to leave her, her entire family was disgusted with her, and she ends up being called the mother of the illegitimate child, but that's just from earth's perspective. Eventually, God's favor wins out. God's favor is never anything you have to apologize for. The angel speaks to Mary, you found favor in the sight of the Lord, you're going to conceive, bring forth a son. She has a question, how is that possible? I'm a virgin. And the angel says, the Spirit of the Most High will come upon you. I don't know about you, but the answer doesn't help me. Like I still have the same question I had when you gave me the answer. How can that happen since I am a virgin? Oh, the Spirit of the Most High will come upon you. How can that happen? I still have the same question. But Mary did the wisest thing, and one of the most profound concepts in Scripture is she stated to the angel, Be it unto me according to your word.
19:43 So we've got three miracle births here. One is Abraham, and it happened when she considered the promise. She considered God's nature, his history and faithfulness. The second, there was a contending. There was a travail in her heart. sometimes the only way you get breakthrough in certain areas of your life is to get before God and be brutally honest. A lot of folks don't know how to do that. Now, I would not suggest you accusing God. I've heard people doing that, and they lived. He's more patient than me. I'd have been throwing lightning bolts, but at least to scare you. but honestly i i think it's appropriate for every believer to have moments where you come before god and you say i know it's impossible for you to lie but it feels like you lied to me i think it's important to own up to what you feel why because it is actually honesty in worship in john 4 it says those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth in spirit is a partnership with the Holy Spirit. It's a co-laboring role that we have in ministering to Jesus, the Lamb of God. But in truth means nothing hidden.
21:03 To do this thing, you know, to give praise, but to hide who we are is not honest worship. And he's looking for people that will literally come and lay everything before him and in spite of everything and in the midst of everything to declare his greatness. Somehow that brought about the miracle for Hannah. And then there's Mary. Mary who just yielded. So we've got Sarah considered, Hannah contended, and Mary surrendered. And each of them are expressions of the kingdom to bring rich fulfillment in life. What is fascinating to me is the Lord wants to manifest what he's doing in the earth through people. And he's not embarrassed by you. In fact, he loves being known as your God. He loves the idea of manifesting himself in your gifts, through your gifts, your history, your family, the good, the bad, the ugly, in the midst of whatever you carried into the relationship.
22:11 He loves being recognized by others as your God in the midst of that. I love the four Gospels for that reason. because they are not only records of the life of Jesus, not only history, but they carry with it the personalities of the four authors, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Matthew writes to the Jews. His first miracle is of a leper being healed because touching a leper was the most forbidden thing for the Jew. and so as Matthew writes to the Jews he reveals Jesus as the lion of the tribe of Judah and he unveils him as this majestic one but he doesn't overuse the name God because out of reverence and value for the Jews that he's writing to and yet he brings the most offensive thing to them that Jesus actually touched a leper where in the Old Testament you touch a leper, you're unclean Jesus touches a leper and the leper's clean Matthew writes this story beautifully.
23:21 It's incredible as he writes to the Jews. And his own bent, his own personality is all through that gospel. And the Lord loves being seen in Matthew's personality. Mark is a different gospel altogether. Mark is kind of referred to as the businessman's gospel. He writes to the Romans. He doesn't bother with fluffy stuff like, you know, genealogies, that sort of thing. He's got the word immediately is in there like 90 times. He's always going bang, bang, bang from one story to the next. He's out to get stuff done. And that's the way he writes this thing. And it's to the Romans. That's how he wrote it. It's a profound book. I love the gospel of Mark. But Mark's personality is seen all through this, this rich, rich gospel. Then you get to Luke. Luke was a doctor. He's a physician.
24:12 He writes about women more than any of the other gospel writers. maybe more than all the other three put together. He writes about women all the time. Why? He's a medical doctor, his own bent in life, his own perspective on humanity. And he reveals Jesus as the son of man, where Matthew revealed him as the lion of the tribe of Judah. Mark revealed him as the servant of all. Luke reveals him as the son of man. And so he deals with his humanity so much more than the others. And it's interesting that Luke, in writing to the Greeks, the first miracle is the casting out of demons, which seems to be the most appropriate for those who had multiple gods. And Luke's personality, his own bent, his own persuasion in life was all through the gospel because God loves to be seen in humanity. He loves to be represented well by the giftings, the calls, the unique personalities. He's not ashamed to be called your God.
25:17 And then we get to John. John, his genealogy has nothing to do with Adam. It has to do with God. In the beginning, God. And that's how John approaches him, because John is revealing Jesus as the divine one. we've got Matthew, the lion of the tribe of Judah. We've got Mark, revealing him as the servant,
25:45 the ox, Luke, the son of man, and John, the eagle. The four faces that are on the beast in Ezekiel and in Revelation carried with them the personality of each of the gospel writers. John's first miracle, forget the healing stuff, he's at a wedding turning water into wine. He reveals the Son of God as the one who likes parties. I mean, you can dumb it down all you want. That's what happened.
26:22 As Chris was reminded of so many times, he turned water into wine for a group that was already drunk too much. He was one who loved celebration. So we have this in the Gospel of John. We have this intimate approach. I'm not wanting to do a study on the Gospels. I'm just wanting to say, you know what? you got your story too. And Jesus is wanting to bring something out of the impossible through you. And he doesn't mind it having your redemptive personality attached. He likes it. I had an experience many years ago in Weaverville. I've shared it with you before. It was in the early days of pastoring up in that wonderful mountain community, the greenhouse called Weaverville, in which many of our leaders were developed. I remember kneeling in my office.
27:17 I would go over there early, early Sunday morning, get the wood stove going to try to heat up the sanctuary. Oh, Jesus. Until we could finally afford to get a heater, and it didn't work well. But I'd get over there early. I'd get in my office, turn the heater on, and close the door, sit there and freeze and pray. You know, my quaking was not renewal. It was the temperature.
27:43 But I'd get in there and pray. I remember kneeling at my chair. I could take you right to the spot. I was kneeling and just worshiping the Lord. And I had this unusual picture come to mind. I wasn't real a visionary in the sense of seeing things. I wasn't one visual. I wasn't a person that would see things very often and still don't a whole lot more than I used to. But I remember as I was worshiping the Lord, I was just worshiping and honoring the Lord, giving him thanks for what he had been doing in our lives, our church, and my life. And as I was doing that, I saw myself, actually, my praise was like putting a crown on his head. And that was an unusual experience. That's not something that I would have imagined. And interestingly, this crown was a pure gold, and it had a mirror finish. It was like, it was a mirror finish. It was not etched. There was nothing about it. It was just this mirror-finished gold. And as I put it on his head and I pulled my hands back, all I saw was my fingerprints on the crown. And I went, oh. And I had a moment of disgust because I was in a season where I actually disgusted my humanity and our humanity, waiting for heaven when everything gets perfect, not realizing how redemptive and how complete his work is in touching our lives.
29:02 And I remember pulling my hands away from the crown and just seeing my fingerprints on the crown. And I literally went, and I looked again, and every fingerprint turned into a gem. And it changed something in my life. That day it changed where I saw, oh, he sees my humanity different than I do. He actually values it. He's not waiting for this life to end so he can get rid of, you know, all the crud and then we'll get on with life. No. He actually values the redemptive work that he's done in each life in here. The moment you received him, the moment he moved in, took up residence in you, in me, he began to do something that was glorious, noteworthy, something that would spread his fame, his glory all over the earth.
29:58 I love these stories of these impossible births. And in honor of mothers, you know, it's probably, the word miracle is probably used in society more with the subject of childbirth than any other subject. The miracle of childbirth. Stunning. and we want to honor you with that. But I want to challenge every believer. There is a miracle that God has been planning eternity past. A miracle. Something impossible. Something that can only be brought forth in its purest form through you. It can't be done by someone else. There's a representation of this wonderful Savior, this wonderful King, that can only be brought forth accurately, powerfully, purely through you.
30:54 And the world is crying for it. They're looking for the expression of Jesus in and through you. The Bible tells us that that all the earth, he is the desire of the nations is the phrase. That means everybody wants a king like Jesus. and since you're his body, everybody wants a body that represents Jesus well, and that's who you are, highly favored, chosen, set aside for the impossible. I believe in the fulfillment of dreams and visions and purposes and all of that stuff. It's something that we talk about fairly often. I do.
31:46 It's not another excuse just to raise up selfish believers. That's nauseating. But somehow in a reaction to potential selfishness, there's a whole branch of the church that has killed the capacity for dreaming so that we make sure we don't become selfish. You know what? I'm willing to take the risk, as you know. I want to see the expression of Jesus in and through you in ways that the world is aching for. Some of you carry certain gifts and graces on your life that are so unique. In fact, everyone does in some measure, but it's so unique that there is a gospel to be written. Don't quote me. I'm not adding any books to the Bible in spite of my reputation on YouTube. But every one of you has a gospel story that can be only told through your life experience. There is a book to be written in and through your experience with this wonderful Savior that will touch people, whether it's the Greeks and the Romans or the cowboys,
33:06 or it's the mountain men, or it's the businessmen, it's the film editors, it's the musicians, it's the politicians. There's a gospel story to be written in and through your life that's to be read by countless numbers of people that will represent him well in a way that they can relate to. And that's the miracle of this Mother's Day that I believe God wants to bring forth. I want you to stand. Jesus make them all pregnant
33:46 You know, I've had fun with the analogy through the years. You can always tell people that are carrying promise. They just, when it comes close to term, they just walk funny. you can't hide it you can hide it for a while but pretty soon everything they think about everything they talk about is designed by what they're carrying and I love to see believers pregnant with promise I really do I don't want yours to be mine I want it to be complimentary I want us to run in tandem I want us to impact a city a state, a nation but I really want an honest representation of this wonderful Savior in and through you becoming a manifest to everybody you can touch he's not through writing a story so father I pray for that I pray that you would awaken dreams and visions as we've prayed for moms today I pray for every person even childhood dreams that seem to be childish the ones you actually gave birth to we pray Lord let them be resurrected let them have a new life breathed on them let there be sense of potential and promise that is unusual for us as a family. I pray for that. I pray for the great spirit of breakthrough, that mantle, that anointing for breakthrough to come and rest upon people. That as Chris prayed for us early today, we'd actually see families restored, prodigals come home, things that were so bent out of line, impossible to be repaired, that you, the great restorer would do it again. And we pray this for your glory. We pray this literally for your glory, for you to be honored. In the wonderful name of Jesus, everyone said amen to all of them.
35:57 I want to have ministry team come to the front real quick. If you could hold your place for a moment, it will help us. Ministry team, come on down here real quick. We want to pray for folks. I know we've already invited prodigals home today, but in case you missed the first one right over here to my right there will be a banner raised up it's called the Freedom Banner and anyone who needs to get right with God my goodness do not leave until you've had somebody pray with you alright hold tight for just a moment give me a chance to get to the back door Jason
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