Anointing 2 1985

For the past 10 Sundays, ever since the first of the year, every message that has come has been based on Isaiah chapter 60, especially the first three verses. It certainly appears as if the spirit of the Lord is saying something to us as a congregation, telling us that this is the year when he lifts his hand of covering in the sense of hiding and says to us, arise, shine for your light has come. But this is the year we are to throw off the bushel and let the light shine and go public.

Well, behold, darkness will cover the earth and thick darkness, the people, but the Lord will arise upon you and his glory will be seen upon you. Nation shall come to your light and Kings to the brightness of your rising. As the year unfolds, many of us expect to see those words from Isaiah 60 confirmed not only here, but in the body of Christ all over the earth, but certainly here too.

We expect to see the gates of the new Jerusalem in the midst of all the darkness and chaos and trouble in the world, throwing themselves wide open and the King of glory coming in and the power of the spirit and life from God going out through those gates like a river of healing water and the nations pouring in to get glory and worship to the one who is in our midst. And so holding to Isaiah 60 as the, as a special word from God at this special time for our life together, we now move on into Isaiah 61 to a passage which was used by our Lord as the theme for his own ministry and which is obviously the theme of the ministry of the body of Christ all over the world. Now you could say that these opening words of Isaiah 61 are meant to be our response.

When God says to us, arise, shine for your light has come. We answer by saying Isaiah 61 verse one, the spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to those who are bound to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me. There is an anointing which has come to us and which is coming to us and like every other anointing, it has come to us and is coming for a specific purpose. David was anointed to be King.

Samuel poured oil on David's head and the spirit of the Lord came upon David and imparted to him a wisdom and an authority and a grace, a power that was not his own. It was from heaven so that he could rule Israel well. Elisha was anointed to be a prophet.

Elijah's mantle was thrown over him. The spirit of God came on him and he began to speak words which were not his own words, which gave evidence that this man was now a prophet of the most high God. Jesus of Nazareth was anointed to be the Messiah.

He came up out of the waters of the Jordan River at his baptism and heaven opened and the spirit descended upon him in the form of a dove and immediately Jesus began to say and do things which were totally out of character with his past life, which gave evidence that he was now the Holy One of God. He was the Holy One of God before, but nobody knew it. Now it was obvious.

And on Pentecost, the gathered believers were anointed, the spirit came on them and they offered their bodies as a living sacrifice and they began to spend themselves in burning ministries to the service of the kingdom of heaven. Now, such a time has come to us. Many of us came to faith long ago or at least sometime in the past.

Many of us received an outpouring of the spirit upon our lives at some point back in the past. But now there is an anointing which is coming to us as a body, as a congregation. And it's not happening only here.

It's happening obviously all over the earth, but it's certainly happening here. And when this anointing comes, that is, as it is coming now, it comes bringing with it specific powers and specific responsibilities, powers and responsibilities which cannot be hidden. A city set on a hill cannot be hid, nor do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel, but on a stand and it gives light to all in the house.

What are these powers and what are these responsibilities which come to us now as the spirit of God visits us with such an anointing? We begin by looking at our Lord's anointing, how it happened with him. Turning to Luke chapter 3, verse 21, we read, Now when all the people were baptized and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was open and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form as a dove and a voice came from heaven. Thou art my beloved son, with thee I am well pleased.

Reading on in chapter 4, verse 1, And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, under this anointing, returned from the Jordan and was led by the spirit for 40 days in the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Skipping over to verse 14 of the same, of course, chapter of Luke, the temptation is described and then when it's over, we read, Jesus returned in the power of the spirit under this anointing into Galilee and a report concerning him went out throughout all the surrounding country and he taught in their synagogues being glorified by all. And he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up and he went to the synagogue as his custom was on the Sabbath day.

And he stood up to read and there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah. He opened the book and found a place where it was written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and the recovering of sight to the blind to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

And he closed the book and gave it back to the attendant and sat down and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. These people had known Jesus since he was a child.

For almost 30 years he had been in their midst. But now suddenly this quiet, obscure carpenter begins to behave in a very different way, in a way that's very hard for them to figure out. He can no longer be the obscure carpenter anymore.

The anointing has come upon him. And whether he likes it or not, or whether they like it or not, there are five things he is now going to do. He's going to preach good news to the poor.

He's going to free the captives. He's going to open the eyes of the blind. He's going to deliver the oppressed.

And he's going to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, a time of special grace, special forgiveness flowing out through his own atoning death, his own shed blood. And the power of the anointing enables him to do these things. And he's going to do them.

You could say that once this anointing comes on Jesus, it's no longer possible for him to be the quiet carpenter minding his own business. Any more than it was possible for King David, once the anointing comes on him, and he's very young when it happens, to remain the shepherd boy minding his own business. Or any more than it was possible for Elisha to remain the farmer at the plow, minding his own business.

David was made a king by his anointing, and he had to begin to experience what that involved. Elisha was made a prophet by his anointing, and he had to move with that. Our Lord was made the Messiah, the Holy One of God, by his anointing, even though he was God the Son before.

Now there is no way he can do anything but move, to be obedient with the Father, with the anointing that has come to him. The power has come to get the job done, and he's going to do it. Now people will say, ah, but that was Jesus.

He was the Son of God. I mean, he was called to do things that no other human being could ever do. And in one sense, we can certainly admit that it's true that only he could lay down his life for the sins of the world.

That was his unique calling that belonged only to him. But that his anointing was any different from the one that is given to you and to me, we have to listen to what he says. And if we think the anointing that comes to us is qualitatively different from the one that came to him, then we really are diverging from what he himself teaches us.

Reading from John chapter 14, verse 12, Jesus is speaking. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and greater works than these will he do because I go to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

If you ask anything in my name, I will do it. If you love me, you will keep my commands. And I will pray the Father, and he will give you another counselor to be with you forever, even the Spirit of Truth, whom the world cannot perceive because it neither sees him nor knows him.

You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. The whole purpose of Jesus coming among us, living among us, teaching, dying on that cross, rising from the dead, was so that he could anoint us with the same anointing that came to him. That's why he did it all.

And in every one of the four Gospels, Jesus is presented as the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit, who anoints. And the anointing that he gives us as we gather in his name is for the purpose of our fulfilling exactly the same five callings that were given to him. Under the power of his cross and in the power of his resurrection, Jesus pours out the Spirit upon us so that we can preach good news to the poor, can free the captives, can open the eyes of the blind, can deliver the oppressed, and can proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

We come together in his name. We worship his glory. We feast on his body and blood.

We rejoice in his forgiveness. We come out into the light with each other in obedience to him and get rid of all the walls that we raise up between each other. And as we do these things, the Spirit of God falls upon us afresh, and we are anointed afresh.

And under that anointing, we go out these doors to fulfill, first of all, the calling to preach good news to the poor, that is, to all the afflicted of the world, to go out there with something good in the midst of a world where there is lie and chaos and trouble and injustice and misery everywhere we turn, to have something decent to say, that God is alive and that he does care, and that Jesus is their master and their Lord and their friend, and he's with them, and he's their Savior. And we preach this good news not just with our mouth, but with our life, in word and deed. Food for the hungry in Jesus' name.

Drink for the thirsty in Jesus' name. A welcome for the stranger in Jesus' name. Clothing for the naked in Jesus' name, and not just those cast off.

Visitation for the sick, healing for the sick in Jesus' name. We go see the prisoner in Jesus' name. And everywhere we go, we create hope.

If everywhere we go, we create kind of an atmosphere of defense, uh-oh, here they come, something's wrong. Everywhere we go, we create hope, even among the people who may not like us and may not want to serve Jesus at all. Somehow, where we go, we come with good news, good news.

And then, we're going to free the captives. Consider how many people in this gathering, right now, have been already set free from some chain or chains. I mean, if we thought, if we could consider how many people have been set free from obsessive fears, or alcohol, or some depression, or drugs, or bitterness, or guilt, and we could go on and on.

And if we were to ask every one of these people who got freed from some chain to stand up, there would be very few of us sitting. Most of us would be standing. Now, if that's true, this must mean that we have something valid, something visible, tangible to offer the world out there.

That we've been set free from our bondage so that we can free the captives. If He freed us, He's going to free them. And so we're going to go out there and we're going to give them that freedom.

And we need to learn to expect that it's going to happen. Even, you know, getting very specific, to expect that even this week, before we come together next Sunday, in each of our lives, we will have the opportunity to touch at least one person with the power of the Lord, so effectively, by what we say and do, that some chain of bondage will snap, and they will experience freedom. Then we're going to open the eyes of the blind.

Week after week, Brother Benny, down here in the front, prays, Lord, open my eyes and let me see. And we cry, Amen, Lord, may it be so for Brother Benny. And we know that Brother Benny sees things that people with 20-20 vision don't see.

We know that Brother Benny has light, and we have light with him. And wherever that light goes, people are set free from blindness. Yesterday afternoon, Lynn and I walked into a bar over on Shane, and Lynn passed a track to a man at the bar.

And he said, what's it about? She said, Jesus. He said, I never saw Jesus. Now what we need to say to that man, and thousands like him, come with us, and we will enable you to see Jesus.

We're going to open your eyes, and you will see Jesus. We need to be confident and clear about this. Open the eyes of the blind.

We're going to deliver the oppressed, the people who are beaten down and crushed by some kind of injustice. We have a flame which can be ignited in the human heart, and if that flame is lit inside their heart, nothing can beat them down, and nothing can crush them. And we have to be the proof of it, that we are more than conquerors, and so can they be.

Listen to how Paul delivers the oppressed in the city of Corinth. He delivers them by proving by his own example that it can be done. Reading from 2 Corinthians 6, verse 3. We put no obstacle in anyone's way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry.

But as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way, through great endurance in afflictions. See, he doesn't say we've got to make the world just. Nobody's going to make the world just except the Messiah, and all the revolutionaries of all time have tried, and it never happens.

And every time, we end up with more oppression. We're talking about something inside. But as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way, through great endurance in afflictions, in hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, tumults, labors, watching, hunger.

Every one of these things this man experienced, and he was not crushed. He was more than a conqueror. How was he able to do it? By what he tells us later, by purity, by knowledge, by forbearance, by kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left.

He has something inside that makes him more than a conqueror, and he freely gives it to anybody who wants it. And he demonstrates that it can be done. And he knows that that doesn't mean everybody's going to shake his hand, pat him on the back, and be his friend.

Oh, no. We are treated as imposters, yet we're true. As unknown, yet well-known.

As dying, and behold, we live. As punished, yet not killed. As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.

As poor, yet making many rich. As having nothing, yet possessing everything. Now, most of us here have experienced in some way what it is to come up out of oppression.

And the only reason we've been set free from oppression is so that we can free the other ones, deliver other people. We're delivered so that we can deliver. Let's do it.

Finally, we're going to go out there and proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, a time of special mercy, wonderful grace, marvelous forgiveness. We're going to go out there and we're going to say to them, the door of heaven is open. Come on in.

Looking at Bill, and I'm sure you won't mind my saying it, I almost fainted. It was May the 20th, 1970, and Bill and I were sitting over here in the study, and I used just those words. And I don't know where they came from.

I know they came from God, but I just said, the door of heaven is open. Why don't you come in? And I just thought, you know, that would roll off. And all of a sudden, Bill is on his knees.

And heaven opened, you know. And as Bill says, you know, the Lord came in, and I've been going downhill ever since. You know, but in a sense, I mean, he came into the kingdom of God at that moment, just with those words.

And we're going to go out, and we're going to say, the banquet is prepared. Come and eat. The Father is waiting.

Come on home. The Son knocks on the door of your heart, wants to come in to you with life. All you have to do is open the door.

Not to be afraid to offer these things. Not to be afraid to speak with such boldness. And as we move with the anointing, we will see, we will see responses from people that we have never seen before.

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And he went to the synagogue, as his custom was, on the Sabbath day. So far, just like he always was.

Nothing different, believe it on him. And he stood up to read. And there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah.

He opened the book and found a place where it was written, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives, and the recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. And he was never the same again.

Now the same anointing that the Father gave to the Son, then the Son gives to us now. Our light has come. The glory of the Lord has risen upon us.

So that we can preach good news to the poor, free the captives, open the eyes of the blind, deliver the oppressed, and proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. Let's go out and do it. And may all the glory go to him.

Let's just wait upon him now in silence and let the Spirit speak specifically to our hearts what he would have us do, even today.