Bill Johnson - The Sacrifice of Praise | SWBC 2026 - S2 | July 29

And when I heard that, I, I bowed my head at the end of the message and I said, "God, I give you the rest of my life to teach me that one thing." [clears throat] See, churches all around the world every week gather, and they gather around a sermon, and right-rightfully so, in the sense that the Word of God is absolutely central to everything we are and everything we do.

And the teaching of the Word is paramount and absolute critical and important.

But Israel camped around the presence.

Yes.

Amen.

[clears throat] I believe that the Lord is restoring the church into being a presence-oriented people, a presence-oriented culture, where the actual manifested presence of God is the, the central theme, the supreme value- Yes ... that which we recognize and honor the most.

I, I don't mean to, to share this in any way in conflict with our culture and our heritage, our history.

We've learned so much, and I don't want to lose any of it.

But I, I know that one of the key things that the Lord has been speaking to me for the last ten years is John 15:7, where He says, "Abide in me.

My words abide in you.

You'll ask whatever you desire, it'll be done for you." So the entire purpose of life is found in being able to co-labor with God and actually have His Word filter through our personality, through our will, and have it become manifest in the earth.

But it takes the abiding and it takes the Word.

The abiding is living in that felt realization of His presence.

There actually has to be an awareness of the person of the Holy Spirit who is God on Earth, a consciousness and awareness of Him.

It's not an emotional feeling, although those are involved.

There's just l-literally on our radar is the fact that we can recognize that God is with us.

A friend of mine said, "If He's as big as He says He is, He shouldn't be that hard to find." [laughs] Learning to recognize the actual presence of God and, and living from that place of presence is the supreme value.

Yes.

The Holy Spirit lives in every believer, but He does not rest upon every believer.

Amen.

Thank you.

The Holy Spirit lives in every believer.

He does not rest upon every believer.

He can, and He's willing to.

I used to run an experiment.