Latest / Real Life Theology Podcast / God's Power Unleashed: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Harvest (feat. Shodankeh Johnson)

Transcript

God's Power Unleashed: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Harvest (feat. Shodankeh Johnson) · Real Life Theology Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome back to another episode on the Real Life Theology podcast.
• 0:08
  Today's episode features Shodanke Johnson, who's going to help us understand how God's
• 0:13
  power unleashed through the Holy Spirit can transform resistant communities and win lost
• 0:20
  people to salvation through disciple making.
• 0:23
  I hope you guys enjoy this episode.
• 0:26
  As somebody from West Africa, we cannot start anything without proper greetings.
• 0:32
  So I bring you a special greeting the African way, from West Africa.
• 0:37
  And I want to say, it's a good thing to be here, it's a good thing to be in the presence
• 0:42
  of God, as always.
• 0:44
  So I want to say, good morning.
• 0:47
  Great, now we can talk.
• 0:52
  As we examine the power of God to win the lost people to salvation, I realize that it
• 1:01
  has been reported or people believe that it took two hours for the killing of John F.
• 1:07
  Kennedy to be made known to the whole world.
• 1:12
  It is also reported and believed that it took 20 minutes, 20 minutes to tell the world about
• 1:18
  the incident of the World Trade Center, September 11.
• 1:22
  But it has taken more than 2,000 years since the death of Jesus Christ.
• 1:27
  Yet many lost people, lost tribes, lost communities have not yet received the goodness of Jesus.
• 1:35
  Many intellectuals have tried to explain this away with very weak excuses.
• 1:40
  Why others just don't believe that this is possible.
• 1:45
  Even when the scripture says, with God, all things are possible.
• 1:54
  In John chapter 15 verse 8, the apostle Paul says to his spiritual children, by this my
• 2:02
  father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.
• 2:11
  The father is concerned about us bearing fruit and that is why Jesus said in his last
• 2:17
  words, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father and
• 2:23
  of the son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded
• 2:29
  you and surely I am with you always till the very end of the age.
• 2:34
  March 28, 1920, Jesus' description of the kingdom of God includes images of abundance
• 2:42
  and fruitfulness, such as catching of fish that breaks nets, soils, plants that bear
• 2:50
  fruitful harvest.
• 2:52
  Jesus spoke about his power to the medium, to be the medium of transformation and expansion.
• 2:59
  And he told his disciples that bringing the harvest from every people group into his kingdom
• 3:05
  is their responsibility.
• 3:07
  He told his disciples never to bury the resources that they have been given but multiply them
• 3:13
  according to their capacity.
• 3:17
  But what has happened today, Jesus gave every one of us his disciples' talents.
• 3:26
  Some have five, some have one.
• 3:29
  But every one of us have talents, talents that we can use to the power of God.
• 3:36
  But many people have buried the talents.
• 3:40
  They are ashamed, they are afraid, and they have excuses.
• 3:44
  There are many believers in Christ Jesus who are currently in reverse gear.
• 3:50
  They are currently in reverse gear, they are backing, they are going backward.
• 3:56
  But there are others who are sitting in neutral, they are sitting in neutral.
• 4:02
  But there are others who are missing in action.
• 4:06
  But God is still doing what he has called us to do.
• 4:12
  God is looking for men and women who are faithful enough, who can trust him, trust his word,
• 4:21
  and step out in faith fully knowing that with God all things are possible.
• 4:31
  With God all things are possible.
• 4:36
  You know God in his infinite wisdom and divine humor, as he has always done in history, decided
• 4:48
  to choose a small nation in West Africa to do a supernatural work using ordinary people
• 5:00
  to become obedience based reproductive disciples who will become the salt and the light not
• 5:08
  only in their communities but beyond their communities.
• 5:13
  This is a humor because this is a place where nobody thought any good would come out of it.
• 5:22
  This is a place where there have been ten years of rebel war that was one of the most
• 5:28
  worst wars on the face of the planet.
• 5:32
  And the very men and very women who have killed and slaughtered people, who fought each other,
• 5:40
  God decided to use them as an instrument of transformation, as a testimony to the world
• 5:49
  that God can do anything if he entrusts it in his hands.
• 5:54
  I want to say today one of the reasons why we are not experiencing the power of God in
• 5:59
  many places is because we have become the Holy Spirit.
• 6:06
  We have become the Holy Spirit and we look at everything from the eyeglasses, our own
• 6:11
  eye lenses.
• 6:14
  And we are so afraid of losing control that we are holding the steering with all our strength
• 6:23
  thinking that it will work.
• 6:26
  But I want to say to you, if God is going to move in this nation, in our own time, in
• 6:34
  our own lives, we have to step out of the way and allow him to take total control.
• 6:42
  He will not take partial control, he will take total control.
• 6:48
  That is what God is asking for.
• 6:51
  I will share with you that God is doing abounding work in the lives of so many people, in the
• 7:00
  lives of drug addicts, prostitutes, rich and engaged communities, prisoners, policemen
• 7:07
  and women, the military, students, African traditional religionists, witch doctors, youths,
• 7:15
  young adults, children, teachers, professors, businessmen and women, and even among our
• 7:22
  cousins.
• 7:24
  God is moving in a new way.
• 7:28
  But I want you to know that this extraordinary work that is being done and this power of
• 7:34
  God that is happening is not being done out of the flesh.
• 7:40
  It's not being done because of intellectualism.
• 7:44
  It's not being done because of the charisma of some people.
• 7:48
  It's not being done because of good teachings and good programs and good systems.
• 7:53
  It's being done because of the move of the Holy Spirit, the move of the power of God,
• 8:01
  the unrestrained move of God, fully knowing that with man it is impossible, but with God
• 8:09
  all things are possible.
• 8:16
  We have seen God use ordinary people to do extraordinary work.
• 8:22
  We have seen God use the most unlikely people, some people that will not even qualify to
• 8:28
  be your janitor in your church.
• 8:31
  We have seen God use them extraordinarily for his own honor and for his own glory.
• 8:40
  And the reason why God is doing this is because we are submitted to the power of the Holy
• 8:46
  Spirit.
• 8:47
  Every day we say, the Holy Spirit, you take total control.
• 8:51
  It is the Holy Spirit and the Word of God that we eat, we breathe, we live, we walk,
• 8:57
  and he is a senior partner in the ministry.
• 9:02
  Without the Word and the Holy Spirit, we can do nothing.
• 9:07
  And because of this, I want to share with you the power of God in the lives of ordinary
• 9:14
  people and how he has brought transformation in communities.
• 9:19
  One of the communities I will quickly share with you is a community in the southern part
• 9:24
  of our country.
• 9:26
  This chiefdom, maybe I will call it this state, for more than 50 years missionaries have tried
• 9:38
  to penetrate them with the gospel, but nothing happened.
• 9:42
  They say we don't want anything to do with Christianity, nothing absolutely.
• 9:47
  People have tried.
• 9:48
  In fact, when you die out of their community and they put you in a casket and they bring
• 9:54
  you, there is a place outside the community where they will receive you and they will
• 9:58
  take you out of the casket.
• 10:01
  Anything that has a semblance of Christianity, they hate.
• 10:06
  One day I was overhearing the chief, the paramount chief who is the king of that clan, discussing
• 10:12
  with another man that they badly need a junior secondary school for their children to attend.
• 10:18
  I heard them.
• 10:19
  I was eavesdropping.
• 10:21
  So once I heard that, I said, God, thank you very much.
• 10:27
  We are going to use this as a platform to create relationship.
• 10:31
  So we went to this community and we asked them what is the need.
• 10:34
  They said, oh, we need a junior secondary school.
• 10:37
  And I said, what do you have?
• 10:38
  Do you have any place where we can start?
• 10:40
  They said, yes, we have this building.
• 10:43
  And so they provided the building.
• 10:45
  We brought in trained teachers, trained and qualified teachers.
• 10:49
  But all of our teachers are also trained disciple makers.
• 10:54
  They came and they stayed in the community.
• 10:56
  And I want you to know that after staying in that community for almost a year, one day
• 11:02
  the paramount chief, who is a king, sent to call me.
• 11:07
  And when I came, I was wondering what is wrong?
• 11:09
  What has gone wrong?
• 11:12
  And they were in a festive mood.
• 11:15
  When I got there, the chief said to me, in this big crowd, in the presence of all the
• 11:19
  elders and other members of the community, he said more than 50 years ago, our ancestors
• 11:25
  said nobody should follow Jesus.
• 11:28
  Nobody.
• 11:29
  And anyone that follows Jesus will be rejected from this community.
• 11:34
  He said, but for one year, we have been looking at the lives of these teachers who have taught
• 11:40
  our children how to read, how to write.
• 11:42
  Our children now speak English.
• 11:45
  And we have been watching their lives and we fully know that they are not part of us.
• 11:51
  They are not our cousins.
• 11:52
  They are not Muslims.
• 11:53
  He said, but I've come to realize that these people have affected the lives of our children.
• 11:59
  And I'm standing in the place of our ancestors that passed the course on us.
• 12:05
  Today, I'm the only one who can do that.
• 12:06
  I'm revoking every course that was passed.
• 12:10
  And from today, from today, I am giving you, anybody that wants to be a follower of Jesus
• 12:16
  in this community is free and will not be persecuted and will be protected.
• 12:21
  I want you to know as I speak to you today, we've planted more than 16 churches in this
• 12:25
  community all to the honor and the glory of the King.
• 12:30
  All to the honor and the glory of the King.
• 12:32
  That is the power of God.
• 12:35
  And this is done by ordinary people.
• 12:37
  I also want to share with you a story of a guy in prison.
• 12:44
  As we do this, we reach out to people in prison.
• 12:48
  There's a guy who has been in prison who did something very serious to a Christian family.
• 12:55
  And they sentenced him in prison for many years.
• 12:58
  While he was in prison, he started to become part of our Discovery Bible studies in prison.
• 13:05
  And as the Discovery Bible studies was going on, they came to the place where they were
• 13:09
  discovering about baptism.
• 13:12
  He repented, he was baptized.
• 13:14
  And after a few weeks, he wrote a letter back to the people that he has offended.
• 13:20
  And he said, I'm asking you to forgive me.
• 13:22
  He said, I was arrogant, I was proud, I never accepted that what I did was wrong.
• 13:28
  He said, but today I realized that what I did was wrong, I'm asking you to forgive me.
• 13:33
  But not only that, I deserve the punishment that has been given me in prison.
• 13:37
  But I want you to know I have met Jesus in prison, and my life is never the same.
• 13:42
  This family responded in tears.
• 13:45
  They started visiting him in prison, and they would pray with him.
• 13:48
  Today, as I say, they are almost families.
• 13:51
  They always visit him once a month, and this guy has become one of the leaders of the Discovery
• 13:55
  Bible studies, and he's touching so many lives in prison.
• 13:59
  It is only God who can do that.
• 14:02
  With God, all things are possible.
• 14:06
  I want to share with you also very quickly before we end, I also want to share with you
• 14:12
  what God is doing with ordinary people, praying for people in our prayer mobilizations in
• 14:18
  communities.
• 14:20
  We have seen which doctors come to know Jesus.
• 14:25
  People who were opposing the gospel have become friends of the gospel, disciples of the gospel.
• 14:30
  Today, they tell other people about the power of God and the power of Christ.
• 14:35
  We have seen people who are involved doing things, rebels, soldiers, former rebels, former
• 14:40
  soldiers who were killing people and who have killed so many people become disciples, baptized.
• 14:46
  Today, there are missionaries and church planters planting churches all over the country.
• 14:51
  It is the work of God.
• 14:53
  It is the power of God.
• 14:55
  I want to end by saying this.
• 15:00
  We will not fully experience the power of God if we don't have a paradigm shift.
• 15:07
  There should be a paradigm shift.
• 15:09
  We should align ourselves back to the gospel.
• 15:12
  There should be a paradigm shift from professionals to ordinary people.
• 15:16
  There should be a paradigm shift from expensive to cheap.
• 15:20
  There should be a paradigm shift from control to the Holy Spirit.
• 15:24
  There should be a paradigm shift from centralized to decentralization.
• 15:29
  There should be a paradigm shift from just knowledge to obedience.
• 15:35
  We need a paradigm shift if we are going to see and fully experience the power of God.
• 15:43
  Remember, what people are going to know about you long after your death is what is important.
• 15:50
  It is not the words on your tombstone.
• 15:54
  It is the words and the lives that you touch and the stories that we tell about you that
• 15:58
  are going to last very long.
• 16:01
  God is still at work.
• 16:02
  He is still God yesterday, today, and forever.
• 16:06
  He has not changed and He will never change for anyone.
• 16:09
  He is the same God.
• 16:10
  If you want, you continue to do what you are doing, but He will not change.
• 16:14
  He is God and He is all-powerful.
• 16:16
  He is all-powerful and He is still in charge.
• 16:19
  I have experienced it, societies have experienced it, communities have experienced it, and literally
• 16:24
  every day we see families from our cousins being saved.
• 16:29
  Every day we see families of our cousins being saved all to the honor and glory of God.
• 16:34
  Let me share one that happened a few weeks ago.
• 16:37
  A fanatic cousin, when I use the word cousin, some of you understand.
• 16:42
  I simply mean Muslims.
• 16:43
  A fanatic cousin who was blasting the church, blasting everything that we were doing.
• 16:50
  He was out of town and his family had an accident.
• 16:53
  His wife was driving and had an accident with the family.
• 16:57
  We were going for prayer mobilization and we met them.
• 17:00
  What we did was that we stopped what we were doing.
• 17:03
  We took them to the hospital.
• 17:04
  His only son needed blood and we gave him blood.
• 17:08
  When he came back, he was told the story.
• 17:10
  When he was told the story, he went to my office.
• 17:14
  He was weeping.
• 17:15
  He cried and he said to me, now you have shown to me that you are more righteous than me.
• 17:21
  And today, he is an advocate for the gospel.
• 17:25
  What man cannot do, God can do.