LIFE Today will host pastor and author John Bevere June 10 to discuss his newest book God Where Are You?! Finding Strength and Purpose in Your Wilderness. The Stream’s Nancy Flory recently sat down with John to talk about his book and to discover how God works through wilderness experiences.

Why did you decide to write your book at this time?

Because I really believe — prophetically — that the body of Christ has been in the wilderness. The greatest attack against your harvest comes just before you come out of it. You look at David, that’s when his wives were kidnapped, when his own 600 men turned on him and wanted to stone him. If you look at Jesus, He’s in the wilderness 40 days. He was tempted for 40 days, but the notable attacks came at the very end. If you look at … Joseph goes into a wilderness — 10 years — but then he goes to the dungeon and that’s when his greatest attack to give up comes.

I felt that God was putting in my heart that the body of Christ has been in a desert. You go into the desert filled with the Spirit but you come out in the power. And I just want to see as many people as possible get through successfully. I don’t want to see them faint just before their harvest. That’s why we actually rushed this, because I really felt like this is a critical year for this message.

Is this an accurate statement: Almost always a trip to the wilderness means change?

Yes. Accurate statement.

Can you explain a little bit?

It’s like I said in the book — there’s God’s promise He makes to us. He’ll give us a glimpse at where we’re going, then the process begins. The process is the refining that’s needed, the wilderness that’s needed to produce the character in us to handle the promise when it comes to pass. If you look at Joseph, if you look at his character, prior to what his brothers did, he was tattling on them, he’s bragging, he’s boasting about his dreams.

If God would have made Joseph the leader that He called him to be immediately, he would have been a very narcissistic, insecure leader. So, the refining that he goes through — the pit, the slavery, the dungeon — refines in him, purifies his character to where when he comes out, he’s a very selfless man. We can see that by the fact that he blesses the guys that did what they did to him. No narcissistic insecure leader would have done that. They would have done what Saul did. Saul never went through a wilderness. David did. David had character, Saul didn’t. His position ended up destroying him.

You mentioned God doesn’t always respond immediately to our cry for help. That is so that we can grow like children?

My very first trip to the desert was about the same time our firstborn son [was born]. I watched how his every whimper and cry for the first couple of years, Lisa’s there, she’s feeding him, you know, spoon feeding him, he eats the meal in five minutes. But then the day came when we said, ‘Okay, time for him to feed himself.’ Three-fourths of the food ended up on the floor. He’s looking at us like, ‘Why? What are you doing?’ I mean, he’s like, ‘Mean parents!’ In reality, we just didn’t want an 18-year-old who had to be spoon fed.

God is no different with us. His goal is to get us to be mature sons and daughters, not babies. Jesus learned obedience by what He suffered. He didn’t bring obedience to the earth, He learned it. The Bible says as Christ suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves for the same for you will suffer for he who suffers in the flesh will cease from sin. [That’s] when we’ve reached complete spiritual maturity.

However, it’s not the suffering that Jesus died to free us from. That’s the thing I’ve got to delineate because there are times that the Bible says submit yourself to God, resist the devil and he will flee. You resist the devil when things are happening that are contrary to the covenant promises of God.

But, usually, it’s like Joseph relationships, David relationships. It’s usually our boss, our family, like Joseph, our family. These are the areas … God’s presence just seems to be not manifesting. ‘Where are you God? We were so close. How come you’re not close to me right now?’ He is close, He’s just not manifesting himself. Job said, ‘I go forward, he’s not there, backward I can’t perceive him, when He works on my left hand I cannot behold him.’ So, God was working on his behalf, he just didn’t perceive it.

The wilderness is when God seems like He’s a million miles away and his promises that he’s made to you are even further. In fact, you’re going backward from the promises many times. But he’s not, because He said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’ It’s just we don’t perceive Him as he’s working on our behalf.

I like this part in the book when you felt the Lord tell you to play your praise and worship CDs. I want you to talk about, if you will, the importance of music in the middle of spiritual heaviness.

Well, the Bible says he gives us the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. Not the garment of worship. I see so many people, a lot of times they’ll go to worship. No, it’s praise. Praise is declaring how great He is, declaring what He has done, declaring His awesomeness, rather than saying, ‘I love you, I love you, I love you.’ That would be worship. God gives the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.

In Psalm 150 it says [praise] breaks the chains that the enemy tries to place. Praise is a very powerful, powerful weapon. That’s why Jehoshaphat sent the praise and worship team ahead of the army. God had them do that and that’s when the enemy went crazy. It’s  very very important that we praise because it truly is a sacrifice of praise then. Because you’re praising God for the great things he’s done, who He is, when you’re not seeing the evidence of it in your own life.

If you look at Joseph, every time he obeyed God his life got worse. So if your indicator is ‘If I obey God, my life gets successful’ — well Joseph should have quit. Because all he does is tell his dreams and he gets the pit and slavery. And then he resists sexual immorality — not just once or twice — every day and it gets him the dungeon. So, think about Joseph. “Every time I obey God, my life condition gets worse.”

You can’t base your obedience to God off of your immediate life condition. You have to realize your obedience to God will always pay off in the long haul. If you’re looking for a short-term benefit, you’re not going to see it if you’re Joseph.

The greater the battle, the greater the victory. Can you give me an example in your life of that?

Yeah, I mean, if you look at what I went through for 3 years, 2 1/2 years, it seemed like the battle of my life at the time, although looking back now — I’ve had worse! But the victory ends up helping so many people. If there’s no battle, there’s no victory at all. How can we call ourselves overcomers and warriors for Christ without battles? So, the child of God’s attitude should be the greater the battle, the greater the victory this is going to produce. The greater the testimony. The lives that will be impacted. The more authority that will be on my life.

As James says, the man who endures temptation receives the crown, right? Of life. Well, a crown speaks of authority. Jesus goes into the wilderness filled with the Holy Spirit and returns in the power. He endured the temptation, he now comes out in the power. So, basically, there’s greater authority that you have once you come through something.

[For example], my mother-in-law was at MD Anderson. Her local doctor gave her six months to live with the cancer that had gone all through her lymph nodes. Her MD Anderson doctor gave her 2 years, if [she went] through this [medication] cocktail. She just immersed herself in the Word of God. She told the head of the department at MD Anderson, ‘Thanks for all your help, but I’m going to believe God.’ She got off the chemo. He said, ‘you’re nuts, you’re going to die twice as fast and in twice as much pain.’ She said, ‘I know you’re telling me medically what you should, but this is God’s.’ Well, that was when she was 39. She passed a couple of years ago at 81. She never went back to the doctor. Never. Never. Not even to test it, not even — nothing. And she didn’t die of cancer.

When I look at my mother-in-law, she was the easiest person to pray for healing. I remember one time she had the flu so bad she was crawling. She said, ‘Would you please pray for me?’ I said, ‘Absolutely.’ I laid hands on her. She literally — and I’m not exaggerating — within 30 seconds was jumping up and down, so excited, she said, ‘I’m going to cook you and Lisa dinner!’ She proceeded to make us a dinner and didn’t have another symptom of it the whole rest of the night or the next day. And she was in bed all day. She had a great faith for healing. She had authority in that area. That’s an area she battled in. So, the greater the battle, the greater the victory, the greater the authority.

What do you want readers to take away from this?

I want them to understand what to do in this season. I don’t want them to waste time saying, ‘God why did you abandon me, God why did you put me on a shelf? God why are you punishing me?’ It’s none of those. The Bible says that there’s a purpose for every season. I want them to understand the purpose. When you understand, that’s your why, [your] purpose. There is always a purpose for the wilderness. There is always a purpose.

There was a purpose for Israel. God said ‘I brought you into this wilderness to humble you and test you so you could know what was in your heart.’ He knows what’s in our heart. We don’t. [Israel] didn’t handle the wilderness correctly. What was supposed to be a one-year journey ends up being 40 years and they never enter their destiny. So, there is a purpose for the season. The wilderness is a season.

I want the readers to understand the purpose. Example. Let’s say these readers want to come to Colorado, their dream has been to ski down the Rockies. So they come, they’ve got their snowboard, they’ve got their gear, they’ve got their goggles, they’ve got their ski pants. They jump on the lift, they go to the top of the lift. When they get off the lift they fall flat on their face. Why? Because it’s summer, there’s no snow on the mountain. That behavior would’ve been perfect in January. What they should’ve done is brought a mountain bike up that chairlift. And they would’ve ridden down the mountain quickly. Now instead, they’ve got to drag all this equipment down. They would’ve skied down or snowboarded down very quickly in the winter.

When you understand the purpose of a season, then you cooperate with it. You get better results. And I just want to see people handle this correctly. I don’t want to keep seeing them saying, ‘Why, why, why?’ Instead of saying, ‘Okay, I’m going to grow from this season. I’m going to meditate in the Word of God. I’m going to ponder the Word of God. I’m going to grow.’ So, that’s my hope.

Editor’s Note: This interview has been slightly edited for clarity.