Anointing

Praise waits for Thee, O God in Sion: and unto Thee shall the vow be performed.                       ~   Psalm 65:1

The word “waits” in this verse can be translated “is silent”.  This seems strange due to the fact that praise is to be any thing but silent.  But this scripture is presenting a picture of  a lion who is silently waiting to pounce upon his prey.  That’s what we’re to be like when we come into the house of God.  We’re to be just waiting to spring forth in praise to God!  What a hugh difference it would make in the anointing in our meetings if everyone came with this attitude.

The story is told about Smith Wigglesworth who once made everyone present in a meeting leave and come back in praising the Lord.  One lady who was present in that meeting remarked years later about how powerful that meeting was.  The psalmist of old told us to “enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise”.  Simple obedience to God’s commands will always produce remarkable results.  Let’s all do a better job at entering His gates!

But Jesus said unto them, “A prophet is not without honor, but in his own country, and among  his own kin, and in his own house.”    ~    Mark 6:4,5

Familiarity is a faith destroying and Spirit quenching thing that every believer must guard against.  Even Jesus faced it in His ministry.  Familiarity happen when we get so accustomed to a person, place, or thing that we no longer regard it as highly as we once did.  When that happens we can no longer receive the blessings from it that God intends for us to receive.  Our faith is then choked and the anointing stops flowing like it once did.  While others around us are blessed, we ourselves are failing to receive. 

We may still get excited about new things but fail to appreciate what God has already blessed us with.  Be on your guard against familiarity and don’t let it have any place in your life!

The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.    ~    Luke 4:18,19

Let me talk to you about the purpose of the anointing.  The anointing isn’t just so we’ll feel good in a service.  It is true that when the anointing is strong in manifestation you do feel it and it does feel good.  But the purpose of the anointing is to bring deliverance.  To destroy yokes and to remove burdens.  Jesus said the anointing was upon Him to preach deliverance. 

Whatever we’re doing, whether it’s preaching or singing we need the anointing so someone will receive deliverance.  That deliverance may not always be something we see on the outside, but something is happening on the inside of that person.  This is why we need to keep it straight in our thinking about the purpose of the anointing.  It’s not so we’ll feel like we’ve been to church, but it’s for the purpose of setting captives free.  Deliverance in spirit, soul, and body is what the Spirit of God is all about!