Big Healing Book - BEING Anointed vs. FEELING Anointed

BEING Anointed vs. FEELING Anointed

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a healing ministry and feel a “whoosh” of the Holy Spirit’s power every service when you lay hands on sick people? I’d certainly like that, and I already have a healing ministry! I don’t feel a “power shower” every time I lay hands on the sick, and neither does anyone else. There are times when I feel absolutely nothing even while the person I’m ministering to struggles to stay vertical. At other times, no one feels anything! I saw a man with a busted back and a blind eye get healed when NO ONE felt anything – my friend who laid hands on him, the man, me, or anyone else. No one involved even felt anything for the rest of the service when it came to this man. But he came back the next night healed!

I am not against healing ministers putting out “highlight reels” of dramatic miracles, and in many of the cases in these collections of great moments, the minister might have felt the power of God in a dramatic way. However, that is not daily reality in healing ministry. The potential drawback with such collages of notable healings is that they can leave the impression that the minister sees such manifestations every single service. I can relate to that because I can remember watching some “greatest hits” videos from healing ministers and just assuming that those ministers had tapped into some far greater anointing than I could ever hope to have. Then I asked myself what was wrong with me and sort of kicked myself for not having figured out their secret to always being God’s man of power for the hour, operating constantly in jaw-dropping manifestations of the Spirit. I didn’t know then what I know now – those ministers DON’T operate that way every service! I can understand not putting out a special “underwhelming moments” video collection from the local Nazareths where they preached and hardly anything happened. That would be very boring and uninspiring to watch. But remember, the greatest preacher ever – Jesus – did no mighty works in Nazareth. He also told His disciples how to handle cases where people in a city rejected His gospel. He didn’t say, “Fast and pray harder and longer until you’ve broken all the demonic strongholds over that city so that you can have miracles after all. When you’re God’s man of power for the hour, you can always have incredible miracles everywhere you go every service!” His instructions were much simpler – leave and preach somewhere else!

Luke 10:10-11:
But into whatsoever city ye enter, and they receive you not, go your ways out into the streets of the same, and say,
Even the very dust of your city, which cleaveth on us, we do wipe off against you: notwithstanding be ye sure of this, that the kingdom of God is come nigh unto you.

So you can see that Jesus did NOT guarantee healings, miracles and success everywhere even for the original 12 apostles of the Lamb! So you will kick yourself unnecessarily if you think that YOU should have amazing rushes of Holy Spirit power going through you everywhere you go when it’s time to lay hands on the sick.

In fact, the apostles in the book of Acts did not have universal “success” in getting people saved! There was usually an angry mob of Jews around who rejected the gospel. Even Paul, who wrote many New Testament books, didn’t manage to convince everyone:

Acts 28:23-24:
And when they had appointed him a day, there came many to him into his lodging; to whom he expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets, from morning till evening.
And some believed the things which were spoken, and some believed not.

You are not greater than Jesus, Paul and the Apostles of the Lamb, so don’t lay unrealistic expectations upon yourself. God only holds you responsible for preaching His Word. You are not responsible for the response!

One trap to avoid, especially after watching dramatic video clips, is to assume that the Holy Spirit is only able to move in power on occasions when you feel like electricity is going through you. If you make this mistake, you’ll back off when it comes to laying hands on sick people when you DON’T feel anointed. You can assume that laying hands on the sick won’t work on that occasion, taking sides with your feelings against God’s Word, which says that you WILL do the things Jesus did and greater (John 14:12) and that you WILL lay hands on the sick and they will recover (Mark 16:18).

If you are baptized with the Holy Spirit, you HAVE received power (Acts 1:8) – the same dumamis power that Jesus had after the Holy Spirit descended upon Him. However, Jesus never promised, “You shall always FEEL like you have power after I baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” Sometimes your flesh might not even feel like getting out of bed, let alone laying hands on a bunch of people. You do not have to FEEL anointed to BE anointed. You ARE anointed if you are Spirit-baptized. You HAVE power. You can go ahead by faith and lay hands on sick people in the name of Jesus without feeling a thing.

Jesus didn’t feel like going to the cross, but He went anyway. His followers are not to be led by their feelings any more than He was. You cannot avoid having feelings as a human being, but you CAN avoid being LED by them! If you decide not to lay hands on someone because you don’t feel anointed, you have just put your feelings in front of God’s Word, which is a sure formula for failure. FEELING anointed is not the same thing as BEING anointed. Good feelings and dramatic senses of voltage going through you will not happen all the time no matter who you are. But the anointing still abides in you anyway (1 John 2:20, 1 John 2:27). You HAVE the anointing! The Holy Spirit, who did Jesus’ miracles, abides in you forever (John 14:16). He is not in you one minute and gone the next, even if your feelings tell you otherwise.

Let’s face it – you don’t always “feel” saved, do you? Salvation is a fact for the Christian, not a feeling. Think how miserable things would be if you always had to “feel” the Lord’s presence with you or “feel” that you are saved to know that you are really saved. It is no different with your Christ-given authority to minister to the sick. The just shall not live by feelings – they shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4, Romans 1:17, Galatians 3:11, Hebrews 10:38).

Some would say, “I’m TRYING to believe all this.” But believing is a CHOICE. If it were not your choice to believe God’s Word or not, God would be unjust to punish you if you failed to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and escape hell. Your eternal destiny depends upon your choice. But your results laying hands on the sick (or backing away from it) depend on your choice, too. Once you know what God has said on the matter of laying hands on the sick, it is now your CHOICE to act on the Word. You cannot blame your feelings if your feelings are contrary. You don’t lay hands on the sick because you FEEL LIKE it works; you do it because you are acting on God’s Word, which is always the right thing to do.

I’m sure that there are readers out there who are where I used to be with these things. I thought that I needed to FEEL something, and if I didn’t, something was wrong. So I would strive vigorously to get “prayed up enough” to feel something, and when I didn’t, I assumed that I needed to get “prayed up” even more. Looking back, what I “felt” was probably more me trying to work myself into an emotional frenzy than anything really having to do with the Holy Spirit. I am glad that those days are behind me! I now realize that Jesus never said that I would have power after I received the Holy Spirit only when I FELT like it and when I was prayed up enough. The devil will always define “enough” as the amount of time you can actually pray plus a little bit more. Don’t get on that treadmill. Does the Word of God work or doesn’t it? Does it require you to be “prayed up” to work effectually in those who believe? Are you going to trust the Word to work, or trust your “prayed up” state to get the job done?

Please understand that I am not minimizing the need to pray. Jesus needed to pray, and so do you! But when Jesus encountered the demonized child in Mark 9:17-29, He didn’t have time to go get “prayed up” for a few hours before He could minister deliverance. You won’t always have time to pray right at the moment, either. I know from experience that sometimes a demon will manifest when you don’t expect it, and you have to just deal with it at the moment rather than coming back another time when you feel like you are more “prayed up.”

Even Jesus had to put His feelings aside. He wanted some “space” after He found out that His cousin John had been murdered. Wouldn’t you want some “alone time” if your cousin just got killed? I doubt that He “felt like” healing a lot more sick people just then. But here’s what happened:

Matthew 14:13-14:
When Jesus heard of it, he departed thence by ship into a desert place apart: and when the people had heard thereof, they followed him on foot out of the cities.
And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.

Jesus put His mission before His feelings.

Even in a service when you lay hands on the sick, sometimes you need to “shut your head off” and FLOW with the Holy Spirit. Let your sole objective be acting on the Word, not reasoning everything out. Reason will tell you that you have no business laying hands on obviously serious conditions. The devil will try to tell you, “It isn’t going to work THIS time!” You can reason your way out of seeing really jarring miracles. No one is going to get a miracle if you chicken out when it’s time to lay hands on the sick.

I used to think, “If only I could be like my friend who has conducted large crusades in Africa – it would be nice to lay hands on the sick without any contrary nagging thoughts going through my head! Surely he doesn’t deal with that at this stage of his ministry when dozens of blind or deaf people have gotten healed in single services!” Then I talked to him about this one day and found out that he had the same nagging thoughts I did while he was in the middle of a prayer line – he just had to press through them and act on the Word just as the rest of us do.

Jesus said that out of your belly (when you’re baptized with the Spirit) shall FLOW rivers of living water (John 7:37-39). He did not say that you would have to PUMP OUT rivers of living water by turning the prayer crank enough until you’re prayed up and something can happen. His intention is that living water should FLOW out of you the way that water FLOWS in a mighty river without anyone having to get behind the water and shove it downstream!

You are in Christ Jesus. The word Christ means Anointed or by extension “The Anointed One.” You are in Anointed Jesus! Let that sink in. You can exercise authority in the name of Jesus the Anointed One. The same Spirit of the Lord who was upon Anointed Jesus is now upon YOU. If the Holy Spirit isn’t anointed, I don’t know who is! YOU HAVE THE ANOINTING. It will help you to confess that out loud – “I have the anointing!”

There are times in ministry when you feel a “whoosh” of the anointing when certain gifts of the Spirit flow through you. But don’t conclude that you aren’t as anointed if you don’t feel something. After years of ministry, I have concluded that sometimes when I felt like there was a lack of anointing, it was actually a crisis of confidence on my part. I had lost boldness and confidence that God would back me when I stepped out in faith to minister healing to others. This could happen after someone I prayed for didn’t receive his healing. The solution was not to rush to find a campmeeting where I could get a special anointing boost, but to get back to the Word concerning the fact that God will never fail me or forsake me. The times when I FELT like He had just plain forgotten about me and my ministry were not times when He actually had! The problem wasn’t even on His end! But if even such great men as David, Elijah and John the Baptist could start having doubts, we also can be tempted the same way.

Let me tell you, there is a WONDERFUL sense of freedom when you get past putting the burden on yourself to be sufficiently prayed up and you just go act on the Word no matter how you feel! You lay hands on the sick in FAITH alone – not based on your feelings or anything to do with YOU. The devil always wants you to get introspective and find some reason why YOU supposedly fall short of being able to do what Jesus plainly said that you could do. With the devil, it’s all about YOU! Let it be all about JESUS instead! Rather than waiting for thrilling goosebumps, just act on the Word and have confidence that God will hasten His Word to perform it (Jeremiah 1:12).