Andrew Wommack - Effortless Change - Part 18

Welcome to our Wednesday’s broadcast of the gospel truth. Today I’m continuing to talk about effortless change and I’m nearing the end of this series and I would really like to encourage you to please get these materials that we’re offering. I think that this is one of the most foundational truths that I could ever share with anybody. These are things that God taught me 40 years ago, and I mean, I still live by these truths. They have never become old to me. This is the root of what God has done in my life and I’m just telling you, that this how God desires to change your life, is not through praying and fasting and begging and beseeching God, but it’s just taking the Word of God and meditating in it day and night and it will make your way prosperous and you will have good success. It’s really that simple.

So, I’ve been teaching from Mark, chapter 4, and let me just once again read verses 16 and 17. I’ve spent a number of days on this. I’ve got to move on and finish the rest of this parable, but these two verses, I mean, revolutionized my life in a big way. So, let me go back and make a few more comments on them and we’ll move on. In verse 16, Mark 4:16, «And these are they likewise which are sown on stony ground: who, when they have heard the word, immediately receive it with gladness: and have no root in themselves, and so endure but for a time: afterward, when affliction or persecution ariseth for the word’s sake, immediately they are offended».

Now, on the previous days of this week, I talked about how that I was in a church with a group of friends who loved me but they just thought I was getting a little extreme with this word stuff. I was getting away from the traditions and the doctrines of the church, and Jamie and I, the Lord spoke to us and showed us that we had to commit ourselves to the Word of God even more than our friends, even more than the church that we grew up in, and we did it and it cost us some relationships, and during this exact period of time, the same period of time, there was a man named Joe Nay. This man was kind of like a, a mentor for me. He’s the one that jump started my spiritual life.

I was already born again, but he had a miraculous encounter with the Lord and everything was just so fresh and new to him that, I mean, he made a huge impact on my life and he got kicked out of the church long before I did. He was more radical than I was and I was still trying to, you know, straddle the fence and walk and please everybody, please the Lord, be radical in what I believed about the word, and yet stay with the people who didn’t believe those things and it was violating their religious traditions, and anyway, a long story, but this man was a real influence in my life. I went to one of his meetings that he was holding in a hotel room because the churches that we knew wouldn’t let him in to preach.

So, he rented a place, he was holding a meeting in a hotel auditorium and when I was at his meeting, he called me out of the crowd and he said, Andy, he said, I see you like a runner on a track, on one of these oval tracks, and he says, you’re running a race and you’re doing a good job, you’re leading the race, you’re winning the race, but the people in the grandstands are yelling at you and telling you that you’re doing it all wrong, and he says, I see you getting off of the track and going up into the grandstands and arguing with the spectators, and he said this, it changed my life. He says, even if you win the argument, you’re going to lose the race.

Quit worrying about the spectators, stay on the track, stay focused, finish the race, and I tell you, that’s pretty obvious, I think, to everybody, but to me, this was just so profound. God spoke to me that because of my teaching of the word and the things that God showed me through the word I was being criticized and my natural tendency was to get up into the grandstands and argue with people and try and convince them, no, you’re wrong. I’m right. You know, I don’t know why it is that we all seem to just have to be right so much and we can’t let people think that we’re wrong, especially if they’ve got a wrong impression.

We feel like it’s our God given responsibility to correct them and straighten them out. God spoke to me and showed me that I am running a race and I have to ignore the spectators. I have to ignore the people who are criticizing me and I have to stay focused on Jesus, the author and the finisher of my faith, and if I start trying to spend my time to justify myself and explain myself, even if I win that argument and if I win an individual over, satan has won because I’m no longer preaching the gospel, but I would be defending myself and promoting myself. I don’t know if you get the application of this, but it is so obvious in my life.

I’ve used this before, but you know, we’ve had many people write blogs against me and my staff brought me some of these blogs and they, one of them, this guy said, Andrew Wommack is the most dangerous person in America, and his rational for that was that I’m not as weird as some people. I’m, I’m not as flashy. I give things away, and so that causes people to lower their guard, but then he came against me because I still believed in the baptism of the Holy Spirit, speaking in tongues, miracles, righteousness, grace, and he came against this, but he said, because I’m not as extreme and I’m not as religious and I don’t shout and scream that it’s more subtle, and he, he said I’m the most dangerous man in America, so anyway, they brought me all of these blogs and showed me these things and said, what do you want us to do about it?

And I told them exactly what I’ve been sharing with you, that these afflictions and persecutions have come trying to get me off the track and justifying myself instead of preaching the gospel and I said, I don’t want to do anything about it. It’s not my place to sit here and defend myself. Who cares? Let them say what they want to.

Well, a couple of months later, they came to me again and they showed me many more blogs and they began to say, some of these are really damaging and they’re saying these terrible things about you, and, and they showed me that, I don’t remember what it was because I didn’t really buy into this at all, but they showed me there was something they could do that would stop these people or stop people from being drawn to their web sites or something and they started showing me this stuff and I just stopped them and I got real strong with them right then and I said, look, I do not want another minute of any of my staff spent on these blogs and what people are saying about me.

I said, you’re getting off the track, you’re going up into the grandstands. I don’t want any of my money, none of my resources spent on defending myself and trying to justify myself. Jesus didn’t do that. You know, Jesus would say things like, you’ve got to eat my flesh and drink my blood, and they thought he was speaking of cannibalism. Of course that’s not what he was talking about. He was talking about in a spiritual sense, but see, most people today if, if you were to say something and people thought you were talking about cannibalism, man, they would fall all over themselves trying to apologize and say, oh no, you misunderstood, and they would try and straighten it out because we’ve all got to be so politically correct and we’re so touchy feely about what everybody thinks about us.

When these people thought he was speaking of cannibalism, you know what Jesus did? He responded by saying, indeed, I tell you, unless you drink my flesh and drink my, eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you. He made it even worse, and of course, they misunderstood what he was talking about, but he didn’t care. You know, they came, his disciples came to him one time and says, he had called Herod, that old fox, and he said some things about him, and they said, don’t you know that they were offended because you said these things? And he said, you know, if they haven’t been planted by my father, they’re going to be plucked up, they’re going to be offended. He says, if they can be offended, they will be offended, and he says, I don’t worry about it, and he didn’t go and try and apologize and say, oh, you’ve misunderstood me.

Please, let me explain. I tell you, Jesus didn’t have the mindset. He, he was not politically correct, and you have to get to a place to where you just don’t worry about the people in the grandstands. You know, one of the things that I do, I have people that’ll write me critical things and I’ve got people on staff that filter those things, but every once in a while they feel like there’s something that I need to see or something, and I’ll read some of these things, and you know, one of the ways that I look at this, I’ll have people say, you should do this and this and this, and they’re always telling me what they should do. One of the things I’ll do is go look at them and I’ll research them a little bit.

And you know what? If it’s a person that has never had a ministry, they’ve never led other people to the Lord, they’ve never done all of these things and yet they’re telling me how to do it, I just, one of the ways I respond to that is sitting there saying, you know, don’t let the person who’s never done anything sit here and criticize you who’s at least out making a difference and touching people’s lives and I just consider the source and I reject it. You have to do this, you have to sit there and, and you cannot let afflictions and persecutions get you off the track of doing what God has called you to do and up into the grandstands arguing with people.

I tell you, that is critical and satan is very subtle. If he can’t keep you from preaching the gospel, then he’ll come against you and he’ll try and persecute you to get you to licking your own wounds, to spending time thinking about yourself and what people say about you and you just need to reckon, it’s just like this says, it says, afflictions and persecution come for the word’s sake. It’s not because of you personally. This really helped me when I saw this. Satan doesn’t hate me personally. I mean, he hates everybody, but it’s not me that he’s so much against. He’s against the Word of God that is in my life. He knows how powerful the Word of God is. He knows what it’s done in my life. He knows what it’s done in the lives of thousands and thousands of people.

Satan knows the potential of God’s word to set you free probably much, much more than what you do, and satan is coming with afflictions and persecutions for the word’s sake. He’s trying to steal the word. Now, if this be true, which it is, and the ma, the real power that I have is to speak God’s truths and to share the Word of God and it’s the Word of God that’s going to change people’s lives, then satan doesn’t care if I’m still on television, but if I was up here just defending myself and promoting myself and trying to explain this person’s criticism and that person’s criticism and if I was dealing with all of these things, but if I wasn’t speaking the word, then satan has won, even if I continue to be on television, even if I continue to reach millions and millions of people.

Satan would win if all I was doing was trying to defend myself and silence my critics because I wouldn’t be preaching the word. I’m telling you, it’s the Word of God that is the power of God. It’s this seed that’s got the miraculous life of God and the strongest thing that the church can do is to put out the word. If the church, a minister, goes to preaching just social things, which I’m not saying that the social things aren’t covered by the word, but I’m saying, let’s say that they just get off to where they’re talking about issues of the day and they aren’t relating the Word of God to it and stuff and if they’re just preaching on, you know, whatever the, the hot topic of the day is, satan has won because they’re, the social issues are never going to re, germinate and release the power of God.

Now, if you teach what the Word of God has to say about homosexuality, has to say about immorality, has to say about keeping your mind stayed on the Lord and on and on and on it goes, well then there’s benefit to that, but we’ve got to stay on the Word of God, and it just, it really helped me when I quit taking persecution personally and I realized, this isn’t because of me. It’s because of the word. It’s because people are upset with God. There are people that have a chip on their shoulder because they were hurt by religion or you know, whoever, whatever the reason is, and if you stand for God, well then they’re just going to immediately come out against you and they may think that they’re against you, you might think that they’re against you, but what it really is, it’s that spirit of anti-Christ that just hates God and anything to do with him and it’s satan coming against the word, and it has, it has really helped me to not take things personally.

As a matter of fact, in a way, I take criticism as a compliment. It’s like if you throw a rock into a pack of dogs, the one that yelps the loudest is the one that got hit. The one that persecutes you is the one who is really under conviction and it’s them trying to silence you and they’re coming against you because of the word that you’re speaking and they’re trying to get you to back off of it, and when I saw this, you know, it’s actually, in a sense, a backhanded compliment. I can stand to be persecuted, but I can’t stand to be ignored, because if I’m ignored, then that means that the Holy Spirit hasn’t taken those truths that I’ve spoken and touched that person. That person has not responded.

You know, in the Bible, Jesus, everywhere he went, he caused a revival or a riot, and that wasn’t only true of Jesus, but it was true of all of his disciples and the people that went out and represented him. They would go into a town and either the town would totally receive and there would be a revival and there would be miraculous results or they would reject, but there was not indifference. If people are indifferent to me, it’s because I am not allowing the Holy Spirit to use me properly, or either that person is just gone so far, their heart is so hard that they’re reprobate and they just are such hard ground that the word can’t penetrate. But under normal circumstances, I can stand a person’s rejection because that means that I got my point across, that they understood the truths that I was trying to say and they just weren’t ready to receive it.

I can stand that, but man, I just don’t like being ignored. I think that if we are ministering the gospel properly that it should cause one of two responses, either a revival or a riot, and so if you understand this properly, man, sometimes when you see people get really upset, that’s because God’s dealing with them, and I like that. I don’t like to see people upset, but I like to see God take the truths and present them to a person, whether they accept it or reject it, I like to be a, a vessel that God flows through and presents truth to people and they have to either accept or reject. I like that. I just don’t like it when people ignore me and it’s like, they don’t even acknowledge what I’m saying and stuff.

So, if you understand it properly, these verses right here have just revolutionized my life to understand that I’ve got to have root in myself, I have to be committed to the Word of God above anything else. When words come out against me like a weapon, I have to condemn them right then. I am not going to let satan steal the word from me, and I’ve come to recognize that afflictions and persecutions are nothing but satan. He’s the one that’s behind that and he’s trying to get me to back up on the Word of God. I don’t have to totally reject it, if I just lose my confidence, if I lose my boldness in sharing the Word of God, if I get worried about what people have to say, well then the Word of God won’t produce in my life. You’ve got to stand and let the Word of God be absolute final authority in your life and you have to defend it.

You know, when you plant a seed in the ground, in a sense, there’s a lot of things that come against that, drought, heat, cold, weeds, all kinds of things come against that seed, and if you just let a seed, if you just plant a seed in the ground and leave it to itself, it might or it might not germinate and release its power. You’ll get much, much better results if you will water it, if you’ll fertilize it, if you’ll pull out the weeds, if you will protect it. If it’s going to be a freeze at night, put something over it, and if you will protect that seed that you plant in the ground, you will have a much greater chance of that seed producing and growing and producing fruit. Likewise, with the Word of God, you can’t just take the Word of God and then go through life and let every person and every circumstance come against it and steal these truths from you.

You need to recognize that we are in a battle. Most people don’t recognize this. They only look on the surface level, they only look in the natural realm and they just look at things from a human standpoint, but there is a God who is trying to influence people and draw people unto himself and release his truth and his love and his goodness into their life and there is an enemy, there is a devil, there is a real evil force. This isn’t just a concept. It’s not a personification of some, you know, in, intangible thing.

Satan is a real person that the Book of Revelation shows will be bound with chains, physical chains, and put into a lake of fire where they are burnt forever and ever. Satan is alive. He is a real person, he’s a real force and he’s got demons. So, there is a real God who is trying to work in your life for good and there is a real enemy who is coming against you, and satan knows the things that I’ve been sharing about the power of the Word of God. He knows that that’s what’s going to change you. He knows that that’s what’s going to make the difference. You can pray, you can fast, you can have people lay hands on you until they rub all the hair off the top of your head and it may help you momentarily for a brief period of time, but the only lasting thing that is going to transform your life is the Word of God.

Satan knows that and he is coming against you trying to steal the word out of your life. I mean, I believe that there are demonic things that happen. I don’t believe that everything that happens is just natural. I believe that sometimes when your car breaks down, when you have a flat tire, when your dog bites you, when this happens, you know, a lot of these things, I’m not saying that every single time it’s something that is spiritual and supernatural going on, but I’m saying, satan can manipulate circumstances the same way that God can manipulate circumstances and satan is out to steal the word from you. He’s out to take your attention away from the Word of God because the Word of God is what’s going to change your life.

If you want this effortless change that I’ve been talking about, I’m telling you, it comes through just having God’s word planted in your heart and protected and nurtured and fertilized. You’ve got to take the Word of God and make it a focus of your life. Satan knows that and a lot of the stuff that’s happening to you is him trying to get you off of the word. I have things happen to me that, you know what? I’ve just learned to say that, I haven’t got time to deal with this. I haven’t got time to worry about this, to think about it.

I need to be in the Word of God and I just cast my care about it over on the Lord and go on and things work out. I’ve learned how to put a priority on the Word of God. I’ve made the main thing the main thing. I haven’t done it perfectly, but this is what I’m desiring to do and I’m encouraging you through these scriptures to take the Word of God and make the Word of God absolute final authority in your life.

Don’t let other people’s rejection and criticism of you deter you in what you believe. You need to take a stand for the Word of God, and if you will do that, and if you do it consistently over a prolonged period of time, remember the teaching I gave at the very beginning of this teaching is about how you have to sleep and rise, night and day. It takes time for this to work, but if you put God’s word first place in your life, and do it over a prolonged period of time, I guarantee you that the Word of God will germinate and begin to start releasing its life in your life and you will be changed. You will be changed for the better. You can be free of sickness and disease and poverty and worry and stress, fear of man and all of these things.

The Word of God is given to make you perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works, 2 Timothy, chapter 3, verse 17. That’s what the Word of God is given for. It will make you perfect. That means complete, mature. The Word of God will do everything that you need. If you will just take God’s word and focus on it and protect it, the Word of God will do everything that you need done in your life. That’s nearly too good to be true, but that’s true. This Bible is alive. Hebrews, chapter 4, verse 12, it’s alive, it’s quick. It’s powerful. It’s not just a human book, this is God breathed. And it will breathe life into you if you will take it and put it first place in your life.