Discouraging Dipsticks
By Rev. Johnny Lee Clary
Rev. Johnny Lee Clary is an ordained elder minister in the Church Of God In Christ, the largest African American denomination in the USA. He is one of the leading advocates for racial unity in the United States and has appeared on countless television and radio shows such as The Billy Graham show, Fox News, Morris Cerullo, Oprah, Morton Downey Jr., Rolanda Watts, Geraldo, Sally Jesse Raphael, Jerry Springer, Ricki Lake, Queen Latifah, Montel Williams, Phil Donahue, A&E Investigative Reports, ABC World News Tonight, Bertrice Berry, The Today Show, A Current Affair, The 700 Club, and Kenneth Copeland's TV show. He has also been a regular guest on TBN's Praise The Lord show and has been featured in America's top newspapers and magazines, including a seven page feature story in Charisma magazine in Feb. 2010, April 1999, Moody Magazine, Guidepost Magazine (Sept. 1998), Kenneth Copeland's Believer's Voice of Victory magazine, as well as appearances on TV programs in Australia, England, Holland, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Sweden, and Wales. He holds the record for the largest crowd ever at Hillsong Brisbane, Australia.
Most of you have been discouraged by others at least once in your life. Sometimes people can be vicious and cruel and make people feel so discouraged they feel like throwing in the towel. God does not want you discouraged. He wants you encouraged! He is on your side. No where in the Bible does it say, “Therefore brethren go discourage one another.” As a matter of fact it says just the opposite; to go encourage one another. (I Thessalonians 5:11)
Dr. Josef Goebbels, Nazi Germany’s propaganda minister was perhaps Adolph Hitler’s most valuable man. He once said if you repeat a lie often enough people will begin to believe it. That is how he got almost the entire nation of Germany to hate the Jews by telling lies about them. The Bible says Satan is a liar and the father of lies. (John 8:44) He will use people to discourage you because he does not want you to succeed. Why? Because if you succeed in fulfilling God’s calling upon your life then you damage his kingdom of darkness severely.
I think back of what would have happened if I would have believed all of the discouragement that came my way. My step-grandfather was one of the worst. When I was 18 I hit bottom and was trying to pull myself up, but every time I tried he said something in an attempt to knock me back down. I had been living poor without anything since I was 11 years old when my father had died. I was sent away by my mother to go live with my sister who was on drugs and was forced to live poor as she spent all of my inheritance money on dope and an alcoholic boyfriend she let move in to live off of my money. I dropped out of school in my senior year, left the ghetto of East LA out in California, packing up an old 1960 Chevy Impala car I had and traveled back to Oklahoma. When I arrived in Oklahoma I got a job in a service station only making $2.10 an hour but at least I was trying. My car broke down and I needed a ride and asked the step-grandfather if he could come get me. He picked me up after work and he had my little brother in the car with him. I climbed into the back seat and he turned to my little brother and said, “Let Johnny Lee be a lesson to you to stay in school and amount to something so you don’t turn out to be a bum like him, up there rolling around in grease for $2.00 an hour. He will always be a bum and will never amount to anything. At least you will be the good one.” I hung my head in shame. It hurt me to be downgraded and discouraged like that.
Thank God even as a sinner back then that I had enough sense not to listen to that old fart that was married to my grandmother. I got my act together, dropped back into high school, all the while keeping my job at the service station at night, got a decent place to live, graduated high school and went on to junior college. Yes I made a ton of mistakes along the way and lived a life of sin and almost destroyed myself many times, until I finally gave my heart to Jesus Christ 21 years ago and entered the ministry. Today I am ordained as an elder minister in the largest African American denomination in the USA even though I am White; I travel all over the world speaking to huge crowds, winning untold thousands upon thousands to Christ; hold record numbers of salvations and church attendance numbers in Australia and New Zealand; am married to a beautiful woman of God; have written a book; recorded music; have appeared on many well known TV shows all over the world; headlined newspapers; was a professional wrestling champion; and I am in negotiations for a movie on my life.
Just think, if I had of listened to the step-grandfather I would probably be dead or in prison today. I often find that people who discourage others are usually trying to take the focus off of their own failures. That was true in the step-grandfather’s case. He was a overweight drunk, an abusive husband to my grandmother, and an habitual gambler who gambled away my grandmother’s home and their life savings, forcing her to live in poverty leaving her nothing but debt when he died. He was a failure at life and he vented his anger at his own self upon me. He died the same year I graduated and when I graduated from high school he never told me congratulations and he refused to come to my ceremony. Remember people that do not succeed in life also do not want you to succeed.
I made up my mind a long time ago to believe God and not man. Man will tell you that you are a failure, and God will tell you that you can do all things through Christ who gives you strength. (Philippians 4:13)
Whose report do you believe; God’s or man’s?
When God told Noah to build an ark he listened to God and got to work building it. There were those who tried to discourage Noah and made fun of him until the flood came as God had promised. They were left outside to drown in their own discouragement while Noah and his family survived because he listened to God and not the discouragers.
Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. (Psalm 1:1)
In spite of God proving time and time again that He is for us there are still those today that choose to listen to the negative ninnies, and then get discouraged. Maybe someone has been telling you things like “You will never amount to anything,” “You can’t be healed,” “Healing was for those back in Jesus’ day but not for today,” “You are going to go broke,” “You can’t do any better than that person so you better get married to them, “ “You will never be a businessman so you better get used to digging ditches,” “You are going to lose,” and “”Don’t listen to those faith people as they are all of the Devil.”
Losers do not want to see you succeed. They will discourage you. Winners do want to see you succeed so they will encourage you.
Your biggest supporter that is cheering you on is God! The word says “If God be for you then who can be against you?” (Romans 8:32)
Stop listening to those negative ninnies! Kick those discouraging dipsticks to the curb! PUT YOUR TRUST IN GOD, not them for He will never fail you nor will He ever leave you! (Hebrews 13:5)
© Johnny Lee Clary International Ministries All Rights Reserved
"Success means having the heart, the valour, and the will to become the person God meant for you to be!" Johnny Lee Clary
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