Transcription of Interview with Brian Johnson:
True worship happens when there’s nothing else, there’s no other options. I experienced something about six months ago. Life caught up with me– it wasn’t sin, it was just some issues I hadn’t dealt with. I had a mental breakdown and ended up on serious medication just so I wouldn’t have panic attacks. It was just hell on earth for me, mentally. It was the most tormenting season. But through that process, I felt like I learned more about surrender. I learned that surrender is in the little details, it’s in the minute-by-minute details that no one sees, the little bitterness and things that we carry– the little things that we hold against each other.
Surrender isn’t just in going down to the altar and saying, “Lord, I surrender,” and then going on as normal. It’s in the vulnerability and the admitting that, “yeah this is what happened.” Through that season, I can honestly say, I feel like I’m surrendered. I’m sure tomorrow I’ll find out another part of my life that’s not surrendered, but the process is what matters.
If we don’t get our confidence straight from God, we’re gonna build great legacies, we’re gonna build names and we’re gonna do all that stuff, but it would all stem from an insecurity, wanting to be noticed, wanting to be known. But when we get our confidence from Him, we can say, “Yeah, you know what? Without Him I’m weak, without Him I was almost in a mental institution, without Him I would have been an addicted drug addict,” and when we have a revelation of Him in those seasons of our lives, that’s the revelation that the world needs.
I would hope that all over the world people would sing “Have It All” and actually mean it, and there would be a grace that would come with the song, that God would be glorified through surrendered vessels.
I just want to say what an incredible blessing the new album is. The whole thing is amazing and points you right to the heart of the Father. I particularly like “You Can Have it All”. God bless you Brian. I watched you and Jenn the other day in Twitter. It touched me. I will be praying for you guys!
Ivan
I experienced that exact same thing last Jan-March 2015. It was literally Hell on Earth and the darkest season of my life filled with sleepless weeks, torment, fear and anxiety (none of which I had ever dealt with to that extreme) but also so sweet at the same time because I had my God to cling to and he was with me every step of the way. It taught me SO much but 1- I NEVER want to experience that ever again, especially for Eternity because the love I experienced during that time from God was immeasurable and brought me to my knees, and 2- it taught me I physically, emotionally and mentally NEED God in every single area of my life and without him it’s death and death is the most horrid thing in the world.
Amen. I went through the same things and God does amazing things through that. He reveals truth and a deeper level of his love. His love and truth is what got me out of it. Never would I ever want to go back through that horrific experience again.
Whoa, powerful testimony, laden with hope, beckoning POWER!!
Thank you for sharing this it brought tears to my eyes. I also have had one of the hardest years of my life last year. I to suffered from panic attacks and anxiety and anyone who has been down that road knows that it feels just at Brian described it as. You feel helpless, sometimes hopeless,afraid, mentally and physically drained with bouts of depression. It’s the worst feeling in the world. I am very excouraged by this because it seems like your the only one facing that kind of a storm and no one else can understand you pain of your struggle. They want to help but they don’t know how. I needed to hear this so much. It reminds me of the verse in the bible that says something about how the struggles (temptations) that we face are no different from others. I’m usually not one to post on things like these but I had to because this spoke to me so much because it’s what I faced myself and that’s where you lean on God the most and because he’s all you’ve got. God is good
When the Power of the Holy Spirit touch our lives and hearts, it is the best feeling EVER. Everytime I feel anxious or helpless or panic I start singing the song I’m no longer afraid of fear I’am a child of God. Repeatedly I feel that God is right there with me, no matter how the storm is trying to wreck my live, I just place God right in front of that storm, and truly believe it is all going to be much better from this point forward.
I love your music, as it is a true blessing to many lives I know. Thank you that you bless us so we can also be a blessing to God through song and worship.
You might not realise but to us the People of God you are the message that we need to hear on earth and that no matter what, we will conquer anything because our Almighty God is bigger than anything. We just need to believe that as we say it, we need to feel it from out heart and know that it is TRUE. God loves us so. My daughter use to be so anxious in the morning before school, and in the car one morning God brought a song to my mind that we use to sing as kids while riding our bicycles to school, I just started singing it out loud before I even knew they started singing it with me, “Jesus loves me yes I know for the Bible tells me so, little ones to him belong they are weak but HE is strong. Yes Jesus loves me, yes Jesus loves me, yes Jesus loves me the bible tells me so”. My car was filled with the Holy Spirit that just gave us our multivitamins for the day, our drive and our salvation. We face many storms, but no storms is to big for God. My children hopped out of the car, filled with Gods grace in their hearts and no sign of fear or panic or anxiousness.
Beautiful, Brian…thank you for being man enough to share. You’re the only guitarist I’ve ever seen play a guitar like you were a keys player! Keep smashing it. Will be praying for you
Thanks for your openness about your struggle. I have dealt with a bit of this myself. I can only speak for myself in saying it is all about dependence on God. All I can ever think of when I am suffering fear and anxiety is that it drives me into the promises of God, into absolute dependence on God and, as you pointed out, surrender; not just in word, but truly. It is written, “Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” 2 Cor. 12:7-9 Trust in Him, brother, for He loves you.
Love this! This is so good.
Thank you.
As I read this testimony and the others that followed in response to transparency and vulnerability, I am at peace in the depths. Add me to the list of these warriors who have fought through a storm of panic, anxiety and mental attack this past year. While I am still pressing through to get past the last view waves, I am encouraged today. Thank you all for sharing. This has parted the sea of fear so that many can walk through in faith behind you to get to the other side of this fight.
As I read this testimony and the others that followed in response to Brian’s transparency and vulnerability, I am at peace in the depths. Add me to the list of these warriors who have fought through a storm of panic, anxiety and mental attack this past year. While I am still pressing through to get past the last few waves, I am encouraged today. Thank you all for sharing. This has parted the sea of fear so that many can walk through in faith behind you to get to the other side of this fight
Brian , SO important that you shared this. Having dealt with this same thing ( since my son David, who plays with you, was a babe,) I KNOW how scary and hard that is. I am so thankful you are speaking out. I still battle with wanting to withdraw from people and crowds and anxiety around them! You are not alone and this will help many as you walk it out. I cannot imagine being in your position and being up there so vuneralbe. It certainly does not show and the power of God comes thru in the music. You are so right that when we draw our identity and well being from Him, this is the answer. Personally when I have been overwhelmed this past year and a half, I have curled up with “We will not be Shaken ” on and listened all night and all day and prayed the songs as I drive. It is so freeing .Thanks so much for your ministry. I have found this is a physiological response to stress! Its emotional and physical response to stress. Our body and emotions are telling us we are in need of Him and an answer to stresses that are too much for us. Phil 4;7 Be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God will keep your heart and mind as you trust in Him. BE BLESSED and keep the faith. Will be praying for you!
It takes years to understand this …or it did me…I still need meds to manage it… But living our lives in His joy and peace is the goal …and being present for our family! I stopped feeling bad for needing some meds.
In Jesus love,
Kim Hislop
Dear Sister Kim, I have had attacks for years and have recently overcome in Christ. It has been a long journey! Bless you in your persistence! I just wanted to share some things that helped me. Daddy God taught me to rest in Him and that was huge. Also believing and living in the finished work of the Cross of Christ, that we already have the victory over the enemy. Graham Cooke’s The Practice of Rest and Dan Mohler’s teaching about identity and all that encompasses that we’re both instrumental. (YouTube or ITunes). Our freedom comes from renewing our minds and believing the truth as well as the simple power of God in the Gospel. Blessings and total freedom in Jesus’ Name! And a hug, too. ?
Hello Brian.
Deeper surrender is such an important thing and in that surrender the closeness with our God becomes more intimate.
I pray for you that all that keeps you from God and His love, the finer details, will be removed, that He gives you His strength, that fear is replaced by peace and hope no matter what is going on in and around you, and that you are a different person from before, more Christ-like, in His image. I pray Your wife and family are cared for by God during these times and they too experience the presence and healing hands of our Lord. In the name of Jesus Christ our Saviour.
From experience, when the Lord does deeper healing from those things that have been hidden, we are not the same afterwards. He is preparing you for a greater purpose and this requires a closeness to Him like never before. It’s not easy going through suffering but good has and will come from it.
God bless you my brother. Stand strong in His living word.
Jane
“But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, so that we might not have our trust in ourselves, but in God, Who raises the dead.” (2 Cor 1:9)
A number of years ago I had the same experience. It was during a seven-week around-the-world trip that I was taking with friends, visiting different Christian groups all over the world. Right at the beginning, the trip began to go haywire for me, and by the time we reached Jerusalem via Taiwan, Hong Kong and India, it came to a head. The bottom dropped out of my life and I fell into a darkness so severe that I was left with no other option but suicide. Only the fact that 150 dear saints were praying 24/7 for us on the other side of the world, totally unaware of what I was going through, kept me from taking my life, as for the next three weeks we made our way through Europe and England.
Upon returning home, I was brought to safety, but still not sure if I was dead or alive, spiritually. Little by little, as I simply sat before the Lord, in absolute, and I mean absolute, poverty of mind and spirit and heart, the Lord began to reveal His infinite and all-powerful Love for me. I felt for the first time a Love and Acceptance that had nothing to do with me, at all. It was the all-encompassing Love of the Father for me. Without realizing it, my prayers changed from “Lord, or God”, to “Father”. I had never so simply, purely and meaningfully addressed God as “Father” before.
Because of this experience, I can say that I have an inner Peace that never goes away. Oh, over the years I have certainly struggled, and experienced confusion, and have made many mistakes as I have learned to grow in Grace. But I have never lost the deep, inner knowledge of His abiding Love for me. At a very deep level, my trust in myself has been transferred to the “God Who raises the dead, Who has delivered us from so great a death, and Who does deliver, and in Whom we are confident that He will continue to deliver.” (v.10)
Thank you, Brian, for sharing your story. It is, and at the same time, is not unique. The working of the Father in each one of our hearts is to completely undermine, so as to destroy, any confidence that we might have in our own abilities, until we know the absolute rest of “ceasing from our own works, as God did from His.” (Heb 4;10)
This was beautiful, Ric. Thank-you so much for sharing.
I have been through extremely dark times and worship music by Bethel and others really helped. The album that God really used to speak to me was Finished by Chris Spring, I recommend listening to this. God of the Impossible was a great track.
Amen. Wow so inspiring. Thanks for sharing.
I am very touched by you sharing this. In my forties, mum of growing children. 6 Months ago I was in exactly the same place … for the first time in my life. I felt like hanging off the edge of a cliff. Panic attacks abounded. In my sleepless nights I tried to listen to Bethel teaching among others. I remember Bill Johnson saying that there is no room for anxiety or depression in the Kingdom. I am a huge fan of Bethel but I felt a failure listening to this. I realised God wanted to deal with trust issues though, as He had spoken to me earlier in the summer about there still being some (heard Him say almost audibly but not in a condemning way: “you still dont trust Me enough”). Like you I went on medication for a short while, to stabilise myself. At the bottom of it all I met Jesus. He spoke to me, although I often couldnt hold on to His truth through the day. You do realise you have nothing left, you are just being carried and have to trust you are as you are surviving through those scary days. I even questioned Gods existence, my own faith. Slowly I found some stepping stones and I am so thankful that I am in a better place again, relatively quickly. I have learned that He is really below us in the deepest pit and when all else fails He is the only reality that is constant even though we cant mentally grasp it.
Wow. Amazing testimonies. I have been going through a bit of this lately as I push closer to God. It is SO hard, but if you keep your courage and CHOOSE to trust Him you’ll make it through. It sucks that this is what we have to go through to learn trust and dependence on God the Father, but like Brian said, it is the way God keeps us from becoming conceited, among other things. Stand on the promises. Stand on His love. For, “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings. And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.” 1 Peter 5:7-9 Stand firm!
Living it as we speak. I have never lived anything worst in my life. Sometimes I get confused because I wonder if it’s a conviction of the holy spirit but all my friends tell me that God woudln’t do such a thing.. I used to spend a lot of time worshipping God by myself but now it’s very difficult, every time I grab my guitar the anxiety or whatever I can call that heaviness feeling gets even worst so I stop. I’ve started taking medicine, even if I don’t like it. It’s a little encouraging to read that a lot of you guys went through something like that and that you’re now back to being your normal selves again, and even better according to what I’ve read. I’ve always been a funny guy who likes to make jokes and to laugh a lot but it’s now been like 2 months that I’ve lost the happiness I usually had. Peace is running away from me, and like David says it Psalms I wet my bed with tears almost every night as my soul is tourmented. God please have mercy on me.
Jean, we are praying for you! We speak His truth, peace and clarity over you. He’s with you, and always speaking. Praying that in this season, He draws you ever closer to His heart, so that you see all of who He is and who He has made you to be.
i just wanna thank you bethel, now it has been revealed that worship is universal and naturally we feel the same aspect on surrendering, im a post teenager and a fervent christian , how i love god, and church thangs, how I love your worship and agree on the essence of surrendering, but i used to/still suffer problems to do with abnormal affection for the opposite sex, it used to leave me in guilty conscience, but nevertheless of all that, i realised i just grew up with it since the first grade ,but of all of it, i acknowledge the power of god in my life and his ministry is glooming through me, i used to be slave to fear, “what if god nolonger like me” but until i red this verse
2 cor 12:
7or with these surpassingly great revelations.So to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.
8Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.
9But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest on me.
i just learnt that, none is ours to control, all we can do is to surrender and BASK of the GRace eversufficient of God
Awesome, thank you for sharing and being so open. I just wanted to encourage you that I suffered for years with a hair pulling disorder. Different from your issue, but the same inability to stop. I have been free now for a while and I just have to share the key to freedom because it took me years to finally understand. I have been through a million and one ways of trying to no avail. First of all, it is essential to be baptized in water and to understand that you are free from sin and alive to God in Christ. Sin has no dominion over you. Romans 6 is literal, baptism is not just a symbol. In Acts 2:38 it is a promise of receiving the Holy Spirit as well, which gives us the power to live a Holy life.
The mindset that is essential is to believe the truth of the Bible that we are no longer under the law of sin and death no matter what is happening at the moment. Even if you are in the midst of struggle say, “God I thank you that I am free in Christ and I am not a slave to sin.” When you release faith, God gives the grace to become it. Dan Mohler talks about this and you can find him on YouTube. You can look under how to be free from addictions or something.
I am telling you this because I suffered agony for 24 years and I don’t want to see a sister in Christ suffer any longer! I love you and my heart goes out to you in your struggle. You have been made free in Christ; don’t let the devil talk you into anything else. I totally understand being in the place of clinging to that Scripture you mentioned. It is beautiful. However, I am thinking of the Scripture about how God’s people perish from lack of knowledge. I believed for so long that I could not stop pulling my eyelashes out because that is what I experienced. Dan Mohler teaches about not basing our theology on our experience but on the Word of God alone. And His word says we are free because Jesus paid. Anyhow, blessings to you and total freedom! I will be praying for you! Feel free to write me for more information or prayer.