The Flow of anointing

This will be our final message in this series on the Holy Spirit for this season. Am sure we will revisit this theme often in the coming days.

In our message last Sunday, we mentioned, that "The Anointing is tangible at times".

There are times (not necessarily always) that we can recognize the anointing.
The anointing can be recognized by our spiritual senses.
The anointing can at times also be recognized by our natural senses.

The anointing of the Holy Spirit is felt in different ways, e.g. like a mantle (a blanket coming on someone), fire (heat), wind (stirring, moving), joy, weighty glory (heavy presence), hand (someone touching you), rain (feeling of refreshing), etc.

Today we seek to learn and explore more about recognizing and tapping into (connecting with) the flow of the anointing.

Key Point: It is as we flow with the anointing, that is, go with what the Holy Spirit is doing, that we see, experience and receive from what He is doing at any given moment.

If we strive with our own fleshly energies, we may succeed in getting an emotional response from people, but this will not last. There will be no permanent change.

Emotion can be stirred by human energy, but transformation comes as a result of the work of the Spirit.

The anointing flowed out of Jesus

Mark 5:24-34
24 So Jesus went with him, and a great multitude followed Him and thronged Him.
25 Now a certain woman had a flow of blood for twelve years,
26 and had suffered many things from many physicians. She had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse.
27 When she heard about Jesus, she came behind Him in the crowd and touched His garment.
28 For she said, "If only I may touch His clothes, I shall be made well."
29 Immediately the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of the affliction.
30 And Jesus, immediately knowing in Himself that power had gone out of Him, turned around in the crowd and said, "Who touched My clothes?"
31 But His disciples said to Him, "You see the multitude thronging You, and You say, 'Who touched Me?' "
32 And He looked around to see her who had done this thing.
33 But the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before Him and told Him the whole truth.
34 And He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace, and be healed of your affliction."

The woman touched Jesus' garment with faith in her heart, with an expectation that something will happen. When we minister to people, we must expect something to happen to them. When you are being ministered to, you need to expect something to happen.
The woman felt in her body that something had happened.
Jesus felt the power flow out of Him - the flow of God's power is tangible

Mark 6:56
Wherever He entered, into villages, cities, or the country, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged Him that they might just touch the hem of His garment. And as many as touched Him were made well.

Luke 6:19
And the whole multitude sought to touch Him, for power went out from Him and healed them all.

Power went out of Jesus and healed people. The same power of the Holy Spirit can flow out of you.

The anointing enveloped a gathering

Luke 5:17
Now it happened on a certain day, as He was teaching, that there were Pharisees and teachers of the law sitting by, who had come out of every town of Galilee, Judea, and Jerusalem. And the power of the Lord was present to heal them.

The power of the Lord was present. There was a tangible sense of God's presence to heal.

Peter's Shadow

Acts 5:14-16
14 And believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women,
15 so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them.
16 Also a multitude gathered from the surrounding cities to Jerusalem, bringing sick people and those who were tormented by unclean spirits, and they were all healed.

The anointing - the presence and power of the Holy Spirit - was released through (or flowed through, or was administered through) Peter's shadow. The shadow is not a tangible 'thing' and yet God used that as a vehicle for the flow of His healing anointing to heal and deliver people who received by faith.

Typology

The work of the Holy Spirit is pictured in several ways: as wind, as water, etc.

John 3:8
The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."

John 7:38,39
38 He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water."
39 But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

The wave
“Flowing in the Spirit” is a natural effect of a life in Christ. What I mean by “flowing in the Spirit” can be described in many ways. I like the image of a surfer in the ocean catching a wave: Through spending years in the ocean, you notice trends in the waves and can tell where they’re heading. You can notice when the current begins to change, pulling you in and letting you know when the wave is coming. Your senses have been attuned to know when the wave will reach its breaking point, and through years of practice and experience you have learned to position yourself to sit in the perfect location to catch the wave. Your senses are also keen to know when to start paddling to catch the wave in stride. Suddenly it is no longer you who are paddling – you catch the wave and the power of the wave moves you forward, directing both your speed and destination.

So it is with flowing in the Spirit. Through spending countless hours with the Lord in prayer, contemplation, Scripture, and worship, we develop our senses: discernment, wisdom, understanding. Our spirits learn to discern changes in the atmosphere. We learn to position ourselves to be vessels of God’s move, and in patience we wait for the waves to come. Wisdom and discernment guide us in moving forward as we receive revelation, the wave. Then we allow that revelation to take us wherever God is leading.
[- Kevin G Cook, www.raworship.com, excerpt]

Similarly in the case of wind surfing or sailing.

Both as individuals and as a corporate gathering, we need to be sensitive to the "flow of the anointing" and go where ever the Spirit of God is leading. We must yield to the anointing. We must flow with the Spirit - in worship times, in our preaching of the Word, in our ministering to people.

We must develop sensitivity to the Spirit - sensitivity to the moving, stirring and flow of the Spirit.

It is as we flow with the anointing, that is, go with what the Holy Spirit is doing, that we see, experience and receive from what He is doing at any given moment.