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Anointed... All
the Time
a temple of the
Holy Spirit
.
If
you're a Christian, then you're anointed because the very word Christian is
derived from the Greek word Christ which means "the Anointed One." The
word Christian means to be anointed like Him! Jesus didn't go to the cross and
pay the price for sin just so you could sail on to heaven in the sweet
by-and-by. He did it so you could be cleansed and become a temple of the Holy
Spirit Who is the anointing. Jesus suffered, died and rose again so that He
could give birth to a new race of reborn men and women who would be equipped
with His own Anointing - a race of believers who would walk this earth, not
only doing the same works that He Himself did, but even greater works
Written
by Kenneth Copeland
"But the anointing which ye have received of him (Jesus) abideth in you...." - 1 John 2:27
When we step fully into the anointing Jesus
has made available to us, we won't just sit around saying, "Praise the
Lord," and feeling spiritual goose bumps.
If you are born again and baptized in the
Holy Ghost, I want you to pay close attention to what I'm about to say because
I have some news for you.
It's good news. So good it will cause you to
shout and jump and praise God.
So good (if you'll
dare to believe it) it will inspire you to jump out of bed in the morning, grin
real big and holler, "Look out, Devil. I'm up again, and I'm going to
whip you all day long!"
What news could produce that kind of joy and
confidence?
The news that you are anointed.
I can almost hear someone's religious mind
working right now.
It's saying, "Well
now, Brother Copeland, I'm just an old sinner saved by grace. I would never
presume to say I was anointed."
You mean you aren't a Christian?
"Why certainly I'm a Christian!"
Well, if you're a Christian, then you're
anointed because the very word Christian is derived from the Greek word Christ
which means "the Anointed One".
Translate the word Christian and you'll find
out it means to be anointed like Him!
In fact, to say you're anything less than
anointed is to reject the inheritance Jesus purchased for you with His own
precious blood.
I realize that's a strong statement, but it's
true.
Jesus didn't go to the cross and pay the
price for sin just so you could sail on to heaven in the sweet by-and-by.
He did it so you could be cleansed and become
a temple of the Holy Spirit Who is the anointing (2 Corinthians 6:16).
Jesus suffered, died and rose again so that
He could give birth to a new race of reborn men and women who would be equipped
with His own Anointing.
Jesus laid down His life so that He could
raise up a race of believers who would walk this earth, not only doing the same
works that He Himself did, but even greater works! (John 14:12).
More Than Passing Out Tracts
The very thought of doing the works of Jesus
staggers the minds of most Christians today.
They just can't see how such a thing could be
possible. No doubt, the first disciples felt the same way.
Especially after the
Crucifixion when they scattered and ran in fear, they must have wondered what
Jesus could possibly have meant when He'd said to them, "It's expedient
for you that I go away."
Expedient? Up to that point, it had been a
complete disaster!
Then everything changed. Jesus rose from the
dead.
He met with the disciples and instructed them
to remain in Jerusalem and wait for the promise of the Father.
Then He said
something that must have thrilled them to the very core: "For John
truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not
many days hence... But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is
come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all
Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth" (Acts 1:5, 8).
Due to our religious traditions, our Western
mind-sets, and our failure over the years to translate the Greek word Christ,
most of us have had very little revelation of what that scripture truly means.
When we think about being witnesses for
"Christ," we usually think about walking around passing out tracts
and telling people the four spiritual laws.
As wonderful as those things might be, I can
assure you, that is not what the disciples were thinking about when they heard
Jesus speak those words.
No, they were thinking about the fact that
the Christ (the One anointed with God's own mighty Spirit and power) had just
told them He was going to immerse them in that same power!
They were thinking about the message Jesus
started preaching after He was baptized with the Holy Spirit in the Jordan
River.
They'd heard it many
times: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me
to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent 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).
Peter, in particular, was probably thinking
of the revelation he had blurted out one day when Jesus had asked, "Whom
say ye that I am?"
"Thou art
Christ, the Anointed One," he had answered, "the Son of the
living God."
Peter, perhaps better than anyone, knew what
that anointing could do. He saw how the anointing operated in Jesus' life.
As a fisherman, he'd seen Jesus draw every
fish in the river of Galilee around his boat.
Even though Peter had fished all night the
night before without catching a thing, when Jesus stepped on board, he ended up
with a net-breaking, boat-sinking load!
Peter had watched Jesus feed thousands with
just a few loaves and fishes.
He'd seen Him heal multitudes and deliver
them from demonic oppression.
Peter had pulled money for taxes from a
fish's mouth at Jesus' instruction. He'd walked on water at Jesus' word.
Peter knew why Jesus could do those things.
It was because He had the Anointing of God on Him.
He had burden-removing, yoke-destroying,
world-changing, devil-chasing, healing, delivering, explosive, supernatural,
universe-creating power of the Holy Spirit flowing through His flesh enabling
Him to do what flesh cannot do!
So, when Peter heard
Jesus say, "You will be baptized with the Holy Ghost and receive power
to be my witnesses," he knew what Jesus was talking about.
He was saying, "Listen,
Peter, the same anointing that's on Me is about to come on you so that the
works I've done, you can do also."
Don't you know Peter's heart was pounding
with excitement when he heard that?
The thought of having that same anointing on
his life was probably more than Peter could imagine.
Then came the Day of Pentecost. The Holy
Spirit roared like a 747 into that upper room where Peter and the others were
praying, and the fiery glory of God sat upon them all.
"And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance" (Acts 2:4).
Can't you just imagine what Peter was
thinking?
My God, we've got it! We've got that
anointing.
The power that was on Jesus is on me now! The
fish will come to my boat now! I'll be able to walk on the water if I have to,
to get this gospel out!
That had to be what Peter was thinking. He
didn't know anything else.
He'd never been to seminary. There were no
theologians there to calm him down and tell him God's miracle working power had
passed away.
All Peter knew was, "Jesus
is the Anointed of God, the Son of the living God, and now His Anointing has
come on us!"
It's Not Just for Preachers
In the light of all that, let me ask you a
question. Why aren't believers today as excited about the Baptism of the Holy
Spirit as Peter was?
Why, instead of charging out into the world and turning it upside down with the power of God like those first disciples did, do most modern-day believers do little more with the anointing than talk in tongues now and then?
For the most part it's because we have had
such a limited revelation of what can actually happen when the Anointing of
Jesus operates through us.
Even Christians who have some understanding
of the anointing often think of it only in terms of the ministry.
They think it operates primarily through
apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers and evangelists, usually within the
context of a church service or meeting.
But the fact is, there is an anointing
through Jesus by the Holy Ghost, that the Father has sent in His Name, to do
any and every righteous act on the face of this earth, by any person who knows
Him as Lord.
In other words, no matter what God has called
you to do there is an anointing available to help you carry that out.
We've been mistaken to think that only
preachers are anointed.
Business people are anointed. Doctors are
anointed. Mothers and fathers are anointed.
If you know Jesus, and you're baptized in His
Spirit, you can expect the power of God to function wherever you are.
You can expect the spiritual gifts or
manifestations of the Spirit to work in your life as you need them.
As 1 Corinthians 12:7
says, "the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit
withal."
Every man. Not just the pastor. Not just the
evangelist, every man.
"For to one is
given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the
same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of
healing by the same Spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another
prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues;
to another the interpretation of tongues" (verses 8-10).
Those gifts are available to anyone who knows
God.
Of course, we don't choose on our own how and
when they operate.
The Holy Spirit causes them to function as He
wills and as we need them to help other people.
You may experience one particular manifestation of the Holy Ghost because you're in a situation where it's necessary, and then never again experience that particular manifestation again.
Although you may not know exactly how the
anointing will manifest, you can have faith it will manifest in some way
because you've been called to be a witness.
The Holy Spirit intends to use you wherever
you are as a witness to the fact that Jesus of Nazareth is anointed with the
Holy Ghost and power.
He intends to use you to demonstrate the fact
that Jesus is still going about doing good, healing those who are oppressed of
the Devil... and He is doing it through you!
I know of one situation, for example, where a
young man went into surgery to have a tumor removed from his brain stem.
It was a very dangerous operation, almost too
dangerous to do.
But the doctor was a born-again, Holy
Spirit-baptized man, and the young man's family was also well taught in the
things of God, so all of them agreed to proceed with the surgery believing God
to direct the procedure.
As the operation got underway and the doctor lowered the scalpel to cut that tumor away from the brain stem, suddenly the Spirit of God arrested him and said, "Don't do it!"
The doctor stopped a moment, prayed in other
tongues, and waited.
Then the voice of the
Spirit spoke further. "The standard-procedure incision is too
thick,"
He said. "Shave
it as thinly as you possibly can."
The doctor made the adjustment and proceeded.
Sure enough, when he separated that tumor
from the brain stem he realized that if he'd made the cut he first intended to
make, the results would have been disastrous.
What happened there?
The Anointing of God on that doctor to help
him do what he's called to do went into effect.
The word of knowledge was made available to
him to help him know what he could not possibly know in the natural.
He was anointed with supernatural power and
skill, and it saved that young man's life.
The Anointing Abides
"Brother
Copeland," you may say, "surely you're not saying that I can
be anointed in everything I do. Surely you're not saying I can be anointed all
the time."
I don't have to say
it. The Apostle John already said it! In 1 John 2:27, he wrote, "But
the anointing which ye have received of him (Jesus) abideth in you...."
The word abide means to remain
"continually".
So that scripture is telling us that if we'll
remain continually in Jesus, His Anointing will remain continually available to
us.
We haven't even scratched the surface of that
glorious truth yet!
We haven't even begun to see what can happen
in our lives if we'll just learn to receive the anointing by faith, stop
hindering it and let it flow.
I've seen glimpses in the spirit of the
amazing things that will take place in days to come as we learn to walk fully
in the anointing.
They're so wonderful and astounding, if I
were to tell you about them, you wouldn't be able to believe it, so I won't even
try.
I can tell you this,
however: When we step fully into the anointing Jesus has made available to us,
we won't just sit around saying, "Praise the Lord," and
feeling spiritual goose bumps.
We'll start seeing the real, supernatural, dunamis power of God at work.
We'll see the same kind of power that came on
Abraham's 90-year-old, barren wife. It was the anointing that enabled Sarah to
have a son.
We'll see the kind of
power that caused it to be said of Moses at 120 years old, "his eye was
not dim, nor his natural force abated" (Deuteronomy 34:7).
We'll see the kind of power that so saturated
the bones of Elisha that when a dead man was inadvertently thrown in Elisha's
tomb, the man was raised from the dead.
It was the Anointing of God that caused those
things to happen and, praise God, we're going to see it operate with that kind
of strength, and even greater, before Jesus returns.
We're going to see the final fulfillment of what Peter preached about on the Day of Pentecost: "And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions; And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke" (Joel 2:28-30).
Some people think the fire and smoke in that
verse refers to destruction. But it doesn't.
Fire and smoke are manifestations of God's
glory.
That scripture is talking about the greatest
outpouring of the power and Anointing of God ever seen on this earth.
We are already in the beginning stages of
that outpouring.
Where is it coming from? It's coming from
within believers like you and me.
And it will keep increasing as the river of
the anointing overflows the banks of our hearts and floods into our homes, our
workplaces, our neighborhoods and our world.
But let me warn you, the increase is not
going to come while we sit around watching TV and filling our time with the
ordinary details of life.
It's going to come as we dig into the Word of
God and build our faith in the anointing.
The more we learn to expect the anointing and
align ourselves with it, the more manifestations of it we will see.
So, get out your Bible and start studying.
Every time you see the word Christ, translate
it and meditate on the fact that it means "the Anointed One and His
Anointing".
Learn how to protect the anointing and how to
live your life in such a way that the Holy Ghost can work freely through you.
Pray like the Apostle Paul did:
“That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Anointed One) the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him: The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, Which he wrought in Christ (the Anointed One)when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in heavenly places, Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all” (Ephesians 1:17-23).
In other words, ask God for a revelation of
what it really means to be anointed with the Anointing of Jesus, to be baptized
in the Holy Ghost with God's own burden-removing, yoke-destroying,
world-changing, devil-chasing, healing, delivering, explosive, supernatural,
universe-creating power.
Ask for a revelation of what it really means
to be a Christian.
Once you walk in that revelation, the world will never be the same again.
Kenneth
Copeland
Web site: Kenneth Copeland Ministries
For
the last 50 years Kenneth and Gloria Copeland have been passionately teaching
Christians all over the world how to apply the principles of faith found in
God's WORD to their lives.
They
have seven ministry offices around the world: United States, Canada, Africa,
Asia, Australia, Europe, Ukraine and Latin America. Their God-given directive
is to preach and teach the uncompromised WORD of God on every available voice,
which is being accomplished through a variety of channels, including our
Believer's Voice of Victory TV and radio broadcasts, podcast and magazine;
Believers' Conventions, Victory Campaigns and Living Victory meetings;
published books, website, and social media channels, to name a few.
With
the expansion of technology, they have more work to do now than ever. They are
determined to let the world know Jesus is LORD, and they are not slowing down
anytime soon!
https://www.cfaith.com/index.php/article-display/21-articles/holy-spirit/16656-anointedall-the-time
