THE DANGERS OF BEING ANOINTED
" .......The Anointing attracts Heaven, people and hell...."
For every man who seeks to serve God effectively, fresh, continuous and full anointing of the Holy Spirit is a basic necessity. No one can break the yokes of Satan, sin and the flesh with the energy of the flesh. The one and only ingredient which everyone who wants to serve God must wait for is the endowment of power from on high. No one either in the Old Testament days or the New Testament era, or in our recent history or even in our contemporary days ever succeeded, unless he learnt how to maintain the anointing on his head. The anointing immediately sets a man apart from his age-mates. It places him at a pedestal of spiritual authority among men. It links him with heaven and makes him a channel of blessing, a conduit to bring to men the grace and power of God.
The anointed man is God’s answer to the cry of people. He becomes God’s messenger who brings to men the mind of God in vivid clarity. What had remained impossible for years in people’s lives, is immediately broken once God finds an anointed man to use. Men in pews are dead only as long as the men on the pulpit are men void of fresh anointing. Revival bursts forth, even in places that are like graveyards and valleys of dry bones, as soon as God finds a man on whom the anointing can be poured.
But then the anointing on a man announces his arrival among the devil and his agents. It provokes jealousy and rage in the kingdom of darkness. It immediately makes the man a target for the devil. Anointing lifts a man up for the devil to attack. While the anointing is highly desirable for effective ministry, it draws also along with it several javelins form the pit of hell. It attracts the critical tongues and the envious eyes. It comes with several perils. It provokes all manner of wicked attacks. The devil identifies the anointing as the most potent weapon he cannot withstand, so he hunts with all vehemence anyone who carries it. He prefers to leave all others alone in pursuit of the anointed man. He seeks every means to destroy the man and contaminate the anointing on his head. He seeks to puncture and leak out the anointing on the man’s life.
All these will happen to him because of the anointing he bears within his jar of clay. The enemy gets alerted once he sees the anointing resting upon a man! He does not bother himself with empty, bogus and powerless men who parade themselves about on the pulpit. He actually sponsors such to keep the pulpit occupied, lest anyone bearing this explosive anointing gets there. It spells doom for him. Once a person is genuinely anointed with the power of God, he becomes a threat to the prince of darkness. He will be hunted down. He will be marked here and there, his steps trailed and traced. Traps, pits, snares and all conceivable means of destruction will be lined up for him.
To be a Christian is enough reason for the devil’s rage; but to now bear the anointing daily in his life is what he cannot tolerate and cannot bear. It sets his wicked heart ablaze with the fury of jealousy. He tempts every anointed man in order to blacklist and discredit him. If he ever finds any loophole, he capitalizes on it to accuse him and silence him in ministry. He lures him into pits, where he can trap him and finish him. He sets him up at various times to trick him into sin, especially the sin of pride. The devil often arranges and sponsors agents to entangle a man of anointing, just to puncture his life and his consecration and commitment to the LORD. He uses what a man loves most to entice him into trouble with his God.
Several men, who bore an anointing over their heads, ended as casualties as the enemy trailed them until he trapped them. This he does severally and in diverse ways. He has succeeded with many and he still pursues those who are proving tough and unbending. He never gives up… He is avowed to give himself no rest until he has made his catch. This witch-hunting of Satan has become a major warfare every servant of God must confront, while he or she carefully bears the grace and gift of God on his or her life. Victory cannot be once and for all… the battles and the attacks are not what happen once. The enemy seeks opportune times to strike again and again. One victory is not a guarantee of the final victory. Each victory must prepare God’s servants for the next line of battle.
The devil lays ambush at every bend and at every lay-by on the high way to heaven. At the high points of great exploits for the LORD, the devil seeks to inflate God’s servant with a sense of personal importance and arrogance. At the tangents of breakthrough in ministry, he is immediately at hand to engage the gear of emotion and presumption until the man of God goes off course. At the valleys of depression and gloom, he comes with despair and accusation. He paints the situation, as if the man of God should abandon the race. He sometimes comes with ridicule, propaganda, criticism and insinuations, even from fellow preachers…
One other striking issue about this constant warfare is the contention the devil raises over the genuineness of everyone who serves God. He contends that most men only draw close to the LORD because of the benefits they derive from that relationship. This makes it a sort of requirement for power in ministry, for the LORD to allow the devil to scrutinize and try out every candidate for the anointing. God, willing to silence the accuser, and to still the avenger, allows His servants to pass through the trials and temptations of the devil. God watches regularly and with keen interest, how His man will prove Him true as the man resists the enemy at every point. It is part of the qualifying examinations for the outflow of the power of God.
The tempter, the devil, tempts to disqualify and to destroy. His temptations can be so intense and fierce… but if a man endures and comes through the fire, without compromise, he proves his unflinching love for God and his willingness to obey Him at all times, especially when obedience means suffering. He shall receive a crown of life. He is granted a place in God’s service. Each time he is to be lifted higher and promoted to handle more responsibility for God, the tempter comes again with the question: “What of his qualifying trials and temptations?”
Though God may sometimes overlook our misbehaviours, the enemy keeps the record of our wrongs. He treasures the list of our mistakes and he seeks to tender it on the day of promotion to higher service. This aspect calls for utmost watchfulness on the part of anyone who seeks to serve God in a growing capacity. Many were discredited and disqualified for the lusts of the flesh they permitted in their bosom in the secret, forgetting that he who sponsors the fall is also coming to draw accusations on it. So put on the whole armour of God so that having done all you will be able to stand.