Where true ministry is concerned we are totally dependent upon the anointing. The Lord wants to anoint all of His servants and every saint is called to be a servant of the Lord. There are many different gifts and callings, but without the anointing they are ineffective.
For instance an unsaved professional singer can sing beautiful hymns but there is no anointing on it.
Whereas a saved person with a mediocre voice and a heart after God can sing the same hymn and you will sense the presence and power of God.
Respect for the anointing is one of the keys to our success in serving the Lord in any capacity. There are a lot of "good works" being done in the power of the flesh, but only what is done under the leading and guidance of the Holy Spirit bears fruit for the Kingdom of God .
The anointing increases order. Whatever the Holy Spirit does, he does decently and in order. I Cor. 14:40. The anointing attracts that which is of God and repels that which is not of God. The anointing lifts burdens and destroys yokes. Is. 10:27.
The anointing brings blessings, and yet the anointing draws attack from the enemy. The anointing is what gives us the power and ability to defeat the enemy (Acts 10:38). The anointing is so important that we need to understand how to increase the anointing in our lives.
I will give you a few of these ways today:
I. Pay the Price of Consecration.
The Hebrew word for anointing or unction is Mesha and means "consecratory gift." We need the anointing to set us apart for ministry. In the Old Testament the priests not only needed to offer blood sacrifices for their sins, but they needed to be anointed with oil, before they ministered. We need to be anointed with the presence and power of the Holy Spirit before we minister. The one distinguishing character of the disciples was that they had been with Jesus.
"Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus (Acts 4:13)."
Consecration involves spending quality time with the Lord. We can't spend time with Jesus and not be affected. The price we must pay is our time. It is time spend sitting at the feet of Jesus in prayer, worship, and the Word. No matter what we do, we can't duplicate the presence of Jesus. There is a price to pay. It takes time to press through the veil of the flesh and get into the Holy Place with the Lord. It takes full and total focused devotion, but once we've grown accustomed to eating of Him and drinking of Him spiritually, we become like David, longing for His courts. There is on other way, to increase the anointing.
II. Obey the Lord.
The Lord gives the Holy Spirit to those who obey Him (Acts 5:32). God doesn't anoint rebellion. He only anoints obedience. Until we live a life of surrendered obedience we will not walk in the presence and power of the Lord. Samson lost the anointing because he was repeatedly disobedient to his Nazarite vow. The Holy Spirit departed from Saul and a distressing spirit came upon him because of his disobedience. Just as an airplane that loses both engines, will lose altitude and eventually crash, so will we if we stop obeying the Lord. God will work with us and hold us up for a season, while he is trying to get us to repent and turn, but if we won't listen, He'll let us coast to a stop and set us on the shelf. He loves us enough to withdraw the endorsement of His anointing from us if we will not submit to Him and seek His plan above our own.
If we are really saved, we will surrender to His will.
Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness (Mt. 7:21-23)!'
III. Stay in Faith
Acts 6:4 says of Stephen, "…And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit…"
Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Ro. 10:17). There are several ways we can hear the Word of God. We can read it out loud, which is a great exercise for building our faith. We can hear it mentally as we meditate on it. We can hear it preached. The word for Word here is Rhematos in the Greek, which refers to the Word uttered. The Word can be uttered by the Holy Spirit into our spirits and conveyed from our spirit man to our minds in the form of the "inner witness" or "still small voice" or it can be uttered by Holy Spirit inspired preaching. This is why we need to be in church services and live meetings where the Word of God is being preached. It builds our faith.
Our faith level is not always the same, just as our gas tank is not always on full. When our Word level gets low, our faith gets low and then the anointing diminishes. People who do not have consistent study in the Word of God, have lower faith levels than those who do. Remember when we had the gas shortage a couple of years ago? We used to keep our tank topped off. We would pull into a station, when we would see one without lines. We didn't know when there would be a situation that we needed a full tank of Gas. There were a couple of days in our area where there was no gas being trucked in. Similarly you never know when you're going to have a demand on the anointing, so stay full in case of emergency. Believe me there will be times when you need every last drop of anointing. If someone needs you to pray to be healed of cancer, you need all the anointing you can get. If you're going to be effective in spiritual warfare, you are going to need all the anointing you can muster to put the forces of darkness to flight. When the tempter comes, the difference between resisting temptation and giving in to it is how much anointing are you operating in. We have to be walking in the Spirit to keep from fulfilling the lust of the flesh (Gal. 5:16).
In the scripture above, we read that Stephen was full of faith and the Holy Spirit. Having faith and being full of the Holy Spirit are mutually complementary. You can't have one without the other. They are like marriage partners. Together they can do far more than alone. One can put a thousand to flight but two can put ten thousand to flight.
My neighbor recently said that her church had some large pieces of wood they wanted to get off their property. We have a wood stove as a supplement to our regular gas furnace. I took another man with me. Together we were able to lift the large slabs of wood into my truck. Alone I could not have lifted them. Alone he could not have lifted them. Together we were able to get the job done. When you walk in faith you'll walk in power of the Holy Spirit. Add the Jesus factor and you have a three fold cord that isn't easily broken.
Oral Roberts advocated "keeping your faith switch turned on." Just as we flip on a light switch and the power immediately surges into the light bulb and we have light. It is when the contacts inside the switch touch that the power begins to flow. So also, when we touch heaven or we touch the man of God, by faith, the Holy Spirit begins to flow. The moment we really believe, we let the power of the Holy Spirit flow. Turn your faith switch on to receive healing. When receiving deliverance, turn your faith switch on. Get a promise from God's Word. Read it, believe it and settle it that you will NOW receive it. NOW faith is (Heb. 11:1). You might be like one of these new fluorescent lamps that takes a while to brighten up, but keep your faith switch on and you'll receive the full anointing to achieve the promise.
IV. Stay in the Word of God.
There is an anointing on the Word of God when read by a believer. The Word of God is referred to as milk. As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby (I Pet. 2:2). One of the key words here is "as." What the Holy Spirit is saying through this verse is that just as a newborn babe demands and craves his mother's milk, we should crave the Word of God regardless of whether we consider ourselves mature and well versed in the scriptures or whether we're newly saved. It has been scientifically proven that babies that feed on their mother's milk during the first twelve months of their development have a greatly reduced risk of developing diabetes and many other diseases than those babies who are fed cow's milk. It stands to reason. We are not cows. We are humans. Our systems are very different. We need the nourishment we were designed for. So also, a believer must learn to feed on the Word of God. The Word of God nourishes us. The Word of God guides us. The Word of God keeps our thinking straight. The Word is what is designed to keep believers from being subject to spiritual diseases of depression, doubt, fear, worry, insecurity and a plethora of other spiritual maladies. The Word of God makes us immune to confusion, deception, and lies of darkness.
Abiding in the Word, feasting on the Word, and cherishing the Word of God brings forth a great anointing. Remember, the Word is likened to milk, and the richest, tastiest portion of milk is the cream. Churning whole milk produces butter, or the cream solidified. When we meditate in the Word of God, we receive special illumination by the Holy Spirit which brings a greater anointing into our lives. "When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil (Job 29:6)"
Stay in the Word of God, meditate in it, pray over it, and mull it over and over in your mind and heart. It will bring forth such a presence and power of God you won't be able to keep from praising God.
V. Love Righteousness and Hate Lawlessness
When you're on God's side, He's on yours. Loving what God loves and hating what God hates is a sure way to receive His blessing of a greater anointing. One of the reasons Jesus was so anointed was because He loved righteousness and hated lawlessness (Heb. 1:9). A people pleasing spirit will quench the anointing. A God pleasing spirit will gain God's favor and increased anointing.
This kind of attitude is evidence of a person who has a heart after God. The Lord is seeking this kind of worshipper. When we get real about not only worshipping God in Spirit, but worshipping Him in TRUTH as well, then He will set a greater anointing upon our lives.
But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him (Jn 4:23). When Jesus drove out the money changers it was a righteous anger and Holy zeal that moved Him. He was hating lawlessness and loving righteousness. God loves it when we hate lawlessness and love righteousness. Stand up for what is right. Stand against what is wrong. You'll incur God's favor. God will back you up with a greater power flow. I saw a church sign recently which read, "If you don't stand for something you'll fall for anything." Don't be a bozo head and just tolerate anything. Stand for what the Word of God says is right. Oppose that which opposes the Word.
VI. Bloom Where You're Planted.
Getting planted in a local church and being faithful to it, will bring a greater anointing on your life. Flakey people that keep uprooting themselves every year or so, hopping from church to church never realize the blessing of (Psalm 92:13). The righteous shall flourish like a palm tree, He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon . 13 Those who are planted in the house of the Lord Shall flourish in the courts of our God. 14 They shall still bear fruit in old age; They shall be fresh and flourishing (Ps. 92:13-14). Faithfulness precedes fruitfulness. Fruitfulness comes by the anointing. The Lord made Aaron's rod bud overnight proving he was His chosen anointed one. Stay faithful where God has placed you. Don't move until God moves you, and believe me. God's not confused. He's not going to be jerking you around moving you from one church to another every year or so. No one can develop stability, faithfulness, steadfastness, and spiritual maturity moving around so often. Let's stay planted where God places us. When we find the house where our God ordained pastor is, we should plan on staying there for many years, never moving at all unless God has a specific plan to send us out to another area to start a church, or do missions work etc. Too many people are moving themselves to places God has not sent them or called them. Don't be one of these uprooted Christians. God anoints people who are faithful. This reminds me of a story of a woman who had been saved three years, but was over 50 years old. She said she was moving to another state. When her pastor asked her why, she told him, "to find work." The pastor asked, "When are you planning to move?" "Next week." She replied. The pastor said, "So you don't have a job there yet?" she said, "No." The pastor said, "Then I can't agree with the way you're doing this, you never consulted me. You never asked me to pray about it. You planned it totally behind my back and you're moving to a place where you have no promise of a future. You have work here. You have a ministry here. God called you here, I can't say for certain you're not supposed to go, because you haven't given me the opportunity to pray about it but I know for sure you are not doing it God's way." "Well she said, I'm over 50 years old, I think I can decide what I should or shouldn't do." The pastor said, "no, you're only 3 years old ( in the Lord) and yes, you have a free will. You can make decisions for yourself but without wise counsel and confirmation, you could be making a big mistake." Don't move yourself. Let God move you. When He does, He'll confirm it with leaders and godly counsel.
VII. Receive impartation.
There is a transference of anointing through the laying on of hands as the Holy Spirit leads. Never let an opportunity to get prayed over by a mighty man or woman of God pass you by. There is something about being prayed over and anointed by a man or woman of God. This is not to say that you cannot also receive an impartation from a distance. I have prayed at times and there was such an anointing over the phone that I knew the person was healed.
There is no distance in the Spirit. We can receive impartation of anointing simply by having anointed people over us long distance. Believe and receive. The anointing is transferrable.
Follow these seven steps in this series to receive a greater anointing.
May the Lord's blessings be upon you,
For instance an unsaved professional singer can sing beautiful hymns but there is no anointing on it.
Whereas a saved person with a mediocre voice and a heart after God can sing the same hymn and you will sense the presence and power of God.
Respect for the anointing is one of the keys to our success in serving the Lord in any capacity. There are a lot of "good works" being done in the power of the flesh, but only what is done under the leading and guidance of the Holy Spirit bears fruit for the Kingdom of God .
The anointing increases order. Whatever the Holy Spirit does, he does decently and in order. I Cor. 14:40. The anointing attracts that which is of God and repels that which is not of God. The anointing lifts burdens and destroys yokes. Is. 10:27.
The anointing brings blessings, and yet the anointing draws attack from the enemy. The anointing is what gives us the power and ability to defeat the enemy (Acts 10:38). The anointing is so important that we need to understand how to increase the anointing in our lives.
I will give you a few of these ways today:
I. Pay the Price of Consecration.
The Hebrew word for anointing or unction is Mesha and means "consecratory gift." We need the anointing to set us apart for ministry. In the Old Testament the priests not only needed to offer blood sacrifices for their sins, but they needed to be anointed with oil, before they ministered. We need to be anointed with the presence and power of the Holy Spirit before we minister. The one distinguishing character of the disciples was that they had been with Jesus.
"Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus (Acts 4:13)."
Consecration involves spending quality time with the Lord. We can't spend time with Jesus and not be affected. The price we must pay is our time. It is time spend sitting at the feet of Jesus in prayer, worship, and the Word. No matter what we do, we can't duplicate the presence of Jesus. There is a price to pay. It takes time to press through the veil of the flesh and get into the Holy Place with the Lord. It takes full and total focused devotion, but once we've grown accustomed to eating of Him and drinking of Him spiritually, we become like David, longing for His courts. There is on other way, to increase the anointing.
II. Obey the Lord.
The Lord gives the Holy Spirit to those who obey Him (Acts 5:32). God doesn't anoint rebellion. He only anoints obedience. Until we live a life of surrendered obedience we will not walk in the presence and power of the Lord. Samson lost the anointing because he was repeatedly disobedient to his Nazarite vow. The Holy Spirit departed from Saul and a distressing spirit came upon him because of his disobedience. Just as an airplane that loses both engines, will lose altitude and eventually crash, so will we if we stop obeying the Lord. God will work with us and hold us up for a season, while he is trying to get us to repent and turn, but if we won't listen, He'll let us coast to a stop and set us on the shelf. He loves us enough to withdraw the endorsement of His anointing from us if we will not submit to Him and seek His plan above our own.
If we are really saved, we will surrender to His will.
Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness (Mt. 7:21-23)!'
III. Stay in Faith
Acts 6:4 says of Stephen, "…And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit…"
Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God (Ro. 10:17). There are several ways we can hear the Word of God. We can read it out loud, which is a great exercise for building our faith. We can hear it mentally as we meditate on it. We can hear it preached. The word for Word here is Rhematos in the Greek, which refers to the Word uttered. The Word can be uttered by the Holy Spirit into our spirits and conveyed from our spirit man to our minds in the form of the "inner witness" or "still small voice" or it can be uttered by Holy Spirit inspired preaching. This is why we need to be in church services and live meetings where the Word of God is being preached. It builds our faith.
Our faith level is not always the same, just as our gas tank is not always on full. When our Word level gets low, our faith gets low and then the anointing diminishes. People who do not have consistent study in the Word of God, have lower faith levels than those who do. Remember when we had the gas shortage a couple of years ago? We used to keep our tank topped off. We would pull into a station, when we would see one without lines. We didn't know when there would be a situation that we needed a full tank of Gas. There were a couple of days in our area where there was no gas being trucked in. Similarly you never know when you're going to have a demand on the anointing, so stay full in case of emergency. Believe me there will be times when you need every last drop of anointing. If someone needs you to pray to be healed of cancer, you need all the anointing you can get. If you're going to be effective in spiritual warfare, you are going to need all the anointing you can muster to put the forces of darkness to flight. When the tempter comes, the difference between resisting temptation and giving in to it is how much anointing are you operating in. We have to be walking in the Spirit to keep from fulfilling the lust of the flesh (Gal. 5:16).
In the scripture above, we read that Stephen was full of faith and the Holy Spirit. Having faith and being full of the Holy Spirit are mutually complementary. You can't have one without the other. They are like marriage partners. Together they can do far more than alone. One can put a thousand to flight but two can put ten thousand to flight.
My neighbor recently said that her church had some large pieces of wood they wanted to get off their property. We have a wood stove as a supplement to our regular gas furnace. I took another man with me. Together we were able to lift the large slabs of wood into my truck. Alone I could not have lifted them. Alone he could not have lifted them. Together we were able to get the job done. When you walk in faith you'll walk in power of the Holy Spirit. Add the Jesus factor and you have a three fold cord that isn't easily broken.
Oral Roberts advocated "keeping your faith switch turned on." Just as we flip on a light switch and the power immediately surges into the light bulb and we have light. It is when the contacts inside the switch touch that the power begins to flow. So also, when we touch heaven or we touch the man of God, by faith, the Holy Spirit begins to flow. The moment we really believe, we let the power of the Holy Spirit flow. Turn your faith switch on to receive healing. When receiving deliverance, turn your faith switch on. Get a promise from God's Word. Read it, believe it and settle it that you will NOW receive it. NOW faith is (Heb. 11:1). You might be like one of these new fluorescent lamps that takes a while to brighten up, but keep your faith switch on and you'll receive the full anointing to achieve the promise.
IV. Stay in the Word of God.
There is an anointing on the Word of God when read by a believer. The Word of God is referred to as milk. As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby (I Pet. 2:2). One of the key words here is "as." What the Holy Spirit is saying through this verse is that just as a newborn babe demands and craves his mother's milk, we should crave the Word of God regardless of whether we consider ourselves mature and well versed in the scriptures or whether we're newly saved. It has been scientifically proven that babies that feed on their mother's milk during the first twelve months of their development have a greatly reduced risk of developing diabetes and many other diseases than those babies who are fed cow's milk. It stands to reason. We are not cows. We are humans. Our systems are very different. We need the nourishment we were designed for. So also, a believer must learn to feed on the Word of God. The Word of God nourishes us. The Word of God guides us. The Word of God keeps our thinking straight. The Word is what is designed to keep believers from being subject to spiritual diseases of depression, doubt, fear, worry, insecurity and a plethora of other spiritual maladies. The Word of God makes us immune to confusion, deception, and lies of darkness.
Abiding in the Word, feasting on the Word, and cherishing the Word of God brings forth a great anointing. Remember, the Word is likened to milk, and the richest, tastiest portion of milk is the cream. Churning whole milk produces butter, or the cream solidified. When we meditate in the Word of God, we receive special illumination by the Holy Spirit which brings a greater anointing into our lives. "When I washed my steps with butter, and the rock poured me out rivers of oil (Job 29:6)"
Stay in the Word of God, meditate in it, pray over it, and mull it over and over in your mind and heart. It will bring forth such a presence and power of God you won't be able to keep from praising God.
V. Love Righteousness and Hate Lawlessness
When you're on God's side, He's on yours. Loving what God loves and hating what God hates is a sure way to receive His blessing of a greater anointing. One of the reasons Jesus was so anointed was because He loved righteousness and hated lawlessness (Heb. 1:9). A people pleasing spirit will quench the anointing. A God pleasing spirit will gain God's favor and increased anointing.
This kind of attitude is evidence of a person who has a heart after God. The Lord is seeking this kind of worshipper. When we get real about not only worshipping God in Spirit, but worshipping Him in TRUTH as well, then He will set a greater anointing upon our lives.
But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him (Jn 4:23). When Jesus drove out the money changers it was a righteous anger and Holy zeal that moved Him. He was hating lawlessness and loving righteousness. God loves it when we hate lawlessness and love righteousness. Stand up for what is right. Stand against what is wrong. You'll incur God's favor. God will back you up with a greater power flow. I saw a church sign recently which read, "If you don't stand for something you'll fall for anything." Don't be a bozo head and just tolerate anything. Stand for what the Word of God says is right. Oppose that which opposes the Word.
VI. Bloom Where You're Planted.
Getting planted in a local church and being faithful to it, will bring a greater anointing on your life. Flakey people that keep uprooting themselves every year or so, hopping from church to church never realize the blessing of (Psalm 92:13). The righteous shall flourish like a palm tree, He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon . 13 Those who are planted in the house of the Lord Shall flourish in the courts of our God. 14 They shall still bear fruit in old age; They shall be fresh and flourishing (Ps. 92:13-14). Faithfulness precedes fruitfulness. Fruitfulness comes by the anointing. The Lord made Aaron's rod bud overnight proving he was His chosen anointed one. Stay faithful where God has placed you. Don't move until God moves you, and believe me. God's not confused. He's not going to be jerking you around moving you from one church to another every year or so. No one can develop stability, faithfulness, steadfastness, and spiritual maturity moving around so often. Let's stay planted where God places us. When we find the house where our God ordained pastor is, we should plan on staying there for many years, never moving at all unless God has a specific plan to send us out to another area to start a church, or do missions work etc. Too many people are moving themselves to places God has not sent them or called them. Don't be one of these uprooted Christians. God anoints people who are faithful. This reminds me of a story of a woman who had been saved three years, but was over 50 years old. She said she was moving to another state. When her pastor asked her why, she told him, "to find work." The pastor asked, "When are you planning to move?" "Next week." She replied. The pastor said, "So you don't have a job there yet?" she said, "No." The pastor said, "Then I can't agree with the way you're doing this, you never consulted me. You never asked me to pray about it. You planned it totally behind my back and you're moving to a place where you have no promise of a future. You have work here. You have a ministry here. God called you here, I can't say for certain you're not supposed to go, because you haven't given me the opportunity to pray about it but I know for sure you are not doing it God's way." "Well she said, I'm over 50 years old, I think I can decide what I should or shouldn't do." The pastor said, "no, you're only 3 years old ( in the Lord) and yes, you have a free will. You can make decisions for yourself but without wise counsel and confirmation, you could be making a big mistake." Don't move yourself. Let God move you. When He does, He'll confirm it with leaders and godly counsel.
VII. Receive impartation.
There is a transference of anointing through the laying on of hands as the Holy Spirit leads. Never let an opportunity to get prayed over by a mighty man or woman of God pass you by. There is something about being prayed over and anointed by a man or woman of God. This is not to say that you cannot also receive an impartation from a distance. I have prayed at times and there was such an anointing over the phone that I knew the person was healed.
There is no distance in the Spirit. We can receive impartation of anointing simply by having anointed people over us long distance. Believe and receive. The anointing is transferrable.
Follow these seven steps in this series to receive a greater anointing.
May the Lord's blessings be upon you,
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