Can I Get a Certain Minister’s Anointing for My Own Ministry?
I’m not sure why you would want another minister’s anointing when he (or she!) is unique and you are unique. As for me, I want my anointing, not someone else’s anointing, because I’m not called to do exactly what that other person is called to do. However, I do understand and agree with a desire to have the Holy Spirit use you in at least a similar way that He uses a more seasoned minister whom you may have seen. You may see that person flow in signs and wonders more than you do and desire to have a greater flow of them in your own ministry. There’s nothing wrong with desiring that.
There is much fuss in certain circles about who received some famous minister’s “mantle” when he died; multiple people can insist that they got the same mantle! I don’t care to get involved in such fusses; I will be quite content to let God use me that way He wants to use me, which is sure not to be a copy of how He used some other minister, regardless of his “mantle.”
So as long as you know that you will not be a copy of anyone else and your desire is to flow in the anointing like someone else, we can discuss some things that work and some things that don’t work.
Just as Jesus taught how not to pray before He taught how to pray, I will start by telling you some things that do not work that are wastes of your time.
The Drive-By Power Grab
“I’ll touch the minister’s clothes or shake hands with him, and when I do, I’ll believe that I receive the anointing that is on his ministry for my own ministry. It will flow out of him and into me.”
That is unbiblical. When people touched Jesus, they did so to get healed, not to sneakily suck His anointing into them so that they could go out and minister the same way. There are no recorded cases of anyone receiving an anointing by this “stealth” method.
When Elisha received Elijah’s mantle, that was a pre-arranged transaction that they both agreed to; Elisha did not sneakily touch Elijah and suddenly get his anointing.
Moses had been grooming Joshua for a long time to take over his leadership role. Joshua did not get that by just brushing up against Moses and believing that Moses’s mantle would instantly be transferred to himself.
When Timothy received what we would call an impartation, it was done with the full knowledge and consent of the leadership in one case (1 Timothy 4:14) and Paul in the other case (2 Timothy 1:6). (The second example is open to the challenges that it was a repeat of the first from Paul’s perspective or that Paul was referring to the gift of the Holy Spirit.) Timothy didn’t get it by brushing up against Paul in a room somewhere without Paul’s knowledge or consent.
If you are looking for a shortcut to walking in the anointing in a notable degree, I’m sorry to have to inform you that there isn’t one. It is utter foolishness to think that an anointing would be transferred to anyone just by having a fleeting contact with someone else who isn’t even aware of the transaction, while the transferee could be living any kind of prayerless, undisciplined lifestyle but still suddenly receive some kind of stupendous spiritual endowment.
The Stealing Line
“I’ll get into his healing line and when he lays hands on me, the power will be transmitted to me and I will believe that I receive his anointing for my ministry.”
You are OUT of line if you do this in a healing line. I’ll refer you to the discussion Beware: Wrong Motives for Getting into Healing Lines for more on why you should NEVER do this.
Please don’t mess up the healing line if you aren’t in it for healing!
Grave Error
“I will go lie on the tombstone of a famous deceased preacher and his anointing will get on me for my ministry just as power emanated from Elisha’s bones when someone was thrown onto his grave.”
This sort of ridiculous thing is what makes unsaved people seriously wonder if we’ve lost our marbles. It certainly isn’t supported by Scripture, as no one ever got that result.
“But wait,” you may protest, “it DID work – look at what happened at Elisha’s grave! The man was raised from the dead by the power in Elisha’s bones! Surely if I practice ‘grave-sucking’ (as some call it) I will get that preacher’s power into me!”
You would do well to read the account more carefully in 2 Kings 13:20-21. First, the man who touched Elisha’s bones was DEAD! He was not a living person who tried to get Elisha’s miracle anointing. Second, the man who came back to life did NOT get Elisha’s miracle anointing! He simply came back to life. There is no account of him then going around with Elisha’s anointing doing the things that Elisha did.
So again, nothing in Scripture supports visiting and lying on a grave to get a ministry anointing.
“But So-and-So has been known to have made repeated trips to the grave of a deceased preacher with a healing ministry,” someone may counter, “and now he has prodigious miracles himself!”
Do you want to get involved with something beyond the Bible because of someone’s experience? You should never get your doctrine from experiences; you should only get doctrine from Scripture! There’s enough IN the Bible that shows you what to do; you don’t need to go BEYOND the Bible.
Sow Money, Reap Anointing
“I will give to that ministry, and then I will be a partaker of the grace that is on that ministry. That means that I will get to flow in the same anointing as the preacher I’m supporting!”
Paul did tell the Philippians, who were among Paul’s financial partners, that they were “partakers of his grace” in Philippians 1:7. However, he did NOT say that they were partakers of his anointing. In fact, a number of Greek commentaries point to a better rendering here: “You all are partakers with me of grace,” as the NKJV renders it. In other words, they partook of grace as Paul partook of grace, but they were not partaking of the grace that was particular to Paul. Most modern translations use phrases such as “fellow-partakers with me of grace,” “partakers with me of grace,” “partakers of grace with me,” and so on. The King James Version is somewhat of an aberration from the mainstream on this verse, but its wide use may explain how people have used this verse to advance the idea of getting someone’s anointing by giving as a partner. Young’s Literal Translation, a good starting point if you have questions about a particular verse, reads, “all of you being fellow-partakers with me of grace.”
Also note the context within the verse itself even in the KJV: “Inasmuch as both in my bonds, and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel, ye are all partakers of my grace.” This grace was upon Paul in his bonds; it is hard to twist this into saying that the kind of grace that enabled Paul to endure his bonds was the anointing on His ministry that had fallen on everyone at Philippi.
We do not see anyone, let alone “all” of them, at Philippi establishing churches, having anointed cloths brought from their bodies to the sick (Acts 19:11-12), or healing everyone in an area as Paul did in Acts 28:8-9. Yet for this verse to mean what it is purported to mean in certain circles, everyone at Philippi would have to be doing those things because they were all partakers of Paul’s grace according to the verse in question. So we really don’t see the idea played out that you could give to the Apostle Paul and get his anointing for yourself. It would be wonderful if there were such a shortcut, but there isn’t. Now if you support a ministry, you do share in the credit for what gets done (including what is done through that minister’s anointing) because your support helped enable him to do what he did. But that is not the same thing as receiving that man’s anointing, which is frankly a ridiculous concept given that only God sets different ministry gifts in the church (1 Corinthians 12:28-30). No matter how “cool” you might think it would be to flow as that minister does, if God has not called you to that particular ministry, no amount of giving will impart that same calling and anointing to you. You can’t set yourself into any particular kind of ministry regardless of how you give; only God can call and separate you to the particular ministry that He has for you. And God’s preparation for your ministry will involve a LOT more than just sending a check to someone.
“But what about the verse about giving to a prophet and getting a prophet’s reward?”
Matthew 10:41:
He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.
Jesus said that if you receive a prophet, you’ll get a prophet’s reward, not a prophet’s anointing or a prophet’s ministry. Whatever he is doing to further the kingdom, those who support his ministry will be rewarded for it because they help make it happen, but that doesn’t mean that they will duplicate his ministry.
Here’s something else to think about:
Luke 8:1-3:
And it came to pass afterward, that he went throughout every city and village, preaching and shewing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God: and the twelve were with him,
And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils,
And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod's steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance.
There is no evidence that Joanna or Susanna or others who contributed financially to Jesus’ ministry ever got His anointing and started going out doing the same things Jesus was doing. Based on popular giving theology, they should have done so because their giving would have released His anointing onto them. And these were people who also got to travel with Jesus and watch Him in action, not people giving to a ministry two millennia later.
Quickie School
“I will attend So-and-So’s school some week, and I will come out ready to flow in that gifting and office by the end of the week!”
There are plenty of Wizard of Oz Schools of Ministry where their motto seems to be, “I can’t give you a brain, but I can give you a diploma.” No one is ready for ANY set-apart ministry office after just one week of training! As great as Paul’s experiences were, it was many years (not days) after he was saved that he stepped into his eventual calling. That is why the better Bible schools and training centers have courses of study that last two or even three years! And even then, a diploma doesn’t give you an anointing or a calling. Only God can give you those.
Just Claim It as Yours
“Since I have Christ’s anointing abiding in me, I can just go out and do whatever anyone else does because that’s my right in Christ! All anointings are mine, so I claim the right to flow in that same anointing that this particular minister flows in!”
While you have Christ’s anointing to do His works in a general sense, there are giftings to stand in certain ministry offices that are not shared with everyone in the Body of Christ. Paul asked, “Are all workers of miracles?” and “Does everyone have the gifts of healings?” (see 1 Corinthians 12:28-30) and the clear answer to both questions is “No.” Certain ministers have divine equipment to stand in their ministry offices. If your calling is to lead a home Bible study, you do not need the same equipment as someone who goes out and preaches to tens or hundreds of thousands of unsaved people at a time on the mission field.
Now that we’ve seen what DOESN’T work, let’s take a look at some things that DO.
Serving Under a Ministry
While serving under a ministry does not guarantee you that same anointing if you are not called to that minister’s office, what if you know you ARE called to that office? God will usually have you serve under someone else with a similar calling to “learn the ropes.” For example, you will probably not be the senior pastor of a large church right after you graduate from a Bible school. You may end up being the youth leader, an associate pastor, a worship leader, or having some other more junior position. You will learn things about pastoring as you serve – a lot of what you’d like to know and maybe even more things you wish you didn’t know! I saw a lot of things as an associate pastor that at least gave me some idea what I was in for before I started pastoring. I also served other ministers with healing ministries by leading worship for them, and sometimes running sound, catching, selling teaching materials, or whatever else they needed me to do, which wasn’t preaching. I did a lot of “helps ministry” before I started preaching healing services myself. It was the best training I could have gotten, as I got to see first-hand what it was like to flow in the kind of ministry I would eventually have.
There’s a saying in the ministry, “Some things are better caught than taught,” and while that’s not a Bible verse, I do agree with that statement. There’s no way you can impart through a book what it feels like when a tangible healing anointing starts manifesting. It got to the point that I knew as soon as the preacher did when he was about to suddenly change the order of the service and start laying hands on people because I sensed when the anointing for that seemed to come into the room, even though I was the piano player. You can’t learn that in a classroom. I also got to see preachers handle situations where I thanked God I that wasn’t the one who had to handle them at the time! I learned from them how to handle those situations. (In some cases, I learned how NOT to handle certain situations! The best mistakes to learn from are other people’s mistakes!) Many Bible schools don’t prepare you for some of the real-life ministry predicaments you can face even if they teach the Bible well. I think more schools today are realizing that the practical side of ministry needs to be taught as well. For example, how do you handle it when everything around you says QUIT, and how do you handle betrayals, church splits, big givers who think they can control your ministry, and other common scenarios?
We can see examples of this type of ministry preparation in Scripture. Two notable examples are Joshua and Elisha. Joshua was Moses’ assistant for a long time. He got to see first-hand what Moses did. Finally, the day came when Joshua had to step into Moses’ shoes as Israel’s leader after Moses died. Elisha was basically the water boy for Elijah. Elisha didn’t do any miracles the whole time he served under Elijah, but he could watch Elijah do them and see what Elijah’s ministry was like. Finally, the day came when Elisha did step into Elijah’s role when Elijah was caught up to heaven. There were other prophets who knew some things back then; some even told Elisha that his master would be taken up that day. But Elisha was the one who had faithfully served Elijah, and he was the one who walked in Elijah’s prophetic office after Elijah was taken up.
It would surprise me just as much to see someone with no field experience be thrust out into full-time ministry as for a prospective pilot to be expected to fly for an airline when all he’s had is ground school to teach him the basics of aviation. There’s a good reason why they require certain numbers of flight hours with an instructor before you can fly solo. Someone with a lot of experience has to be there with you during your early flights. You can read books about riding a bicycle, but that’s not the same as riding one. You can read books about playing the piano, but you’re not ready to give your own solo piano recitals (I did a couple in my teenage years) if you don’t spend a lot of time actually sitting at a piano working on your skill.
So assigning you to serve someone else for a season (often longer than you think He should!) is one method that God very often uses to prepare someone to flow in the office that someone else is flowing in now.
Observation and Association
You can watch someone flow in the anointing and learn some things that way. This certainly applies in cases where you’re serving someone else as described above, but you can also watch people who are not in that kind of relationship with you. Sometimes God will bring people who flow in the anointing across your path with whom you can associate even if you don’t report to them in a ministry setting, and you can learn some things from them. It’s easier to walk in faith when you can watch others around you walk in faith. You can follow their example, just as Paul urged people to follow his example (1 Corinthians 4:16, 1 Corinthians 11:1).
This will not by itself confer someone’s specific ministry anointing on you, but if your calling is the same as the calling of the person you’re observing, you can learn some things about flowing in the anointing that go with your office. This will help you flow in that anointing.
When you watch someone else’s boldness, there’s just something about it that rubs off on you. I had the privilege of preaching at a church in a mountain village in Costa Rica where the founder of the church started it by doing an outdoor miracle service in that village. He commanded rain to stop in the middle of the service, and it did. Many people got saved that day. Also, during the service, someone had come up with a child whose feet were perpendicular to his body instead of straight. I’d never heard of that particular deformity before, but the eyewitnesses at the meeting recall hearing bones snap as the preacher grabbed the child’s feet and instantly straightened them out in the name of Jesus. It was an undeniable miracle. I was fascinated to hear the first-hand accounts. Now I had spent some time with that preacher and was actually staying at his house while I was in that country. I was preaching under his tent in the capital city, and at the end of the service, a woman brought her child up for prayer. The child’s feet were perpendicular to his body instead of straight! I had just preached a message (in Spanish) entitled “Jesus Heals Everything” and apparently this woman believed my message! I share a little more about this encounter elsewhere in the book, but the bottom line is that I grabbed his feet and turned them and they straightened out on the spot right in front of everyone! I can tell you that at least it was “easier” in a way knowing what my host had already done, so I knew that it was certainly possible for God to heal that particular kind of deformity on the spot. I could have known that from the Word, of course, because with God, all things are possible (Mark 9:23). Still, it’s helpful to be around people who are used like that – it definitely has an influence on you! When I saw multiple broken backs healed in front of me in rapid succession in a single service when someone else was praying, it increased my boldness when a person with a broken back came up to me – it helped avoid the thinking, “Uh-oh, this case might be over my head.” To this day, I’ve had a lot of success ministering to people with back issues.
I have served under ministries that didn’t make it in the long run, but I’ve served others whose ministries are still going as I write this. You can at least learn to follow the attitude of faith that the failed ministers had. But if you follow some people too closely, picking up all their habits, you can end up slipping into the same pitfalls that ensnared them. One of these preachers had signs and wonders that I loved to watch, but my personal observation was that he never seemed to take time to pray and study the Word before he preached. I used to wonder how he could “get away with that,” as I figured that if I didn’t take time to study and pray, my ministry would be on the scrap heap in short order and I’d not see any signs and wonders. In the long run, he didn’t “get away” with anything, and his carnality cost him his ministry later on when he fell. I was still positively influenced by his faith, though not by his personal example. Shortly before he fell, he was ridiculing the man who founded the Bible school that he had attended, claiming that the founder had “lost it” mentally. (The Bible school founder had written a book that made this preacher angry because it stepped on his toes.) But the Bible school founder did well until he went to be with Jesus, and it was the mocker who ended up “losing it.” The last time I saw the mocker preach, I had agreed to play the piano for him as in earlier days and I wished afterward that I had not been publicly associated with his meeting – his message was so carnal, it was almost unbearable to hear. It was nothing like the strong faith messages he used to preach. His downfall followed in short order. Some things will cost you eventually. You’ll never see his name in this book, as trying to destroy someone else is a bad idea. I understand that some fakes need to be exposed, but those are rare and extreme cases. This particular person is finally out preaching again and I will not hinder him. We can still critique and disagree with other people’s doctrines, but there’s a difference between that and publicly shaming someone. For that matter, I have no personal gripe with most anti-faith preachers. Plenty of horrifically anti-faith preachers are nice, moral people when you meet them in person.
Reading and Listening
You can also pick up someone’s attitude of faith by reading that person’s books or listening to that person’s recordings. The person might be long gone, but if his works are preserved that way, you can still pick up his faith attitude. This is similar to the previous point. A particular hero of mine is Fred Francis Bosworth, who wrote the book “Christ the Healer” in the first half of the 1900’s. Brother Bosworth saw a lot of miracles and emphasized faith in the Word rather than trying to get people to rely on his personal giftings. When I get to heaven, I will thank him for the blessing that his book was to me, though of course I never could have met Brother “F.F.” in person since he went to be with Jesus two years before I was born.
In turn, Brother Bosworth was influenced by other preachers he knew personally, including two famous healing ministers. For a time, Bosworth lived in a “Christian utopia” founded by the one of those healing ministers. (I’m certainly not saying that Christian utopias are good ideas; the healing minister’s “utopia” venture turned into a colossal failure.) That minister had a spectacular healing ministry, but later in life he got into serious doctrinal error and ethical failures. The second minister also had a spectacular healing ministry, and fortunately, he did not flame out the way the first one did.
Summary
There are some good “longcuts” to walking in the anointing the way that another minister does, but no shortcuts. You probably noticed the pattern that the methods that don’t work for walking in another minister’s anointing are attempted shortcuts and “get-anointed-quick schemes,” while the methods that do work require a lot more time on your part. God does not have a “blue light special” going on with His ministry giftings.
See also: