Anointed to Overcome

(This is chapter 15 of the book The Way of Sonship: Anointed to Overcome)

Within ancient Hebrew culture the word “blessing” meant a gift brought upon bended knee. It had the same meaning as the word “grace” (in Greek “charis”). It meant benefit, favour, gift, joy, pleasure and the divine influence of God upon the heart to turn people from their wicked ways and bring the true heartfelt righteousness of living a life of both faith and love. It has as similar meaning as the word “anointed” (in Greek “chrio”), Yehovah’s anointed or “Christ” with similar names as “Blessed One” or “Chosen One” was gifted by Yehovah God with the fragrance of the anointing oil which represented the life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God that gifted the anointed one to accomplish his or her purposes in God. In Psalm 105, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were all described as the prophets and the “Anointed” (“Mashiyach” in Hebrew, “Christos” in Greek) of Yehovah. Within ancient Israel, Prophets, Priests and Kings were chosen by God to be anointed with fragrant anointing oil in the name of Yehovah to give them overcoming power to accomplish His purposes not their own. The name of Yehovah was an expression of His behaviour, character or personality that was an expression of His eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit. Prophets were anointed to speak the living word of God, priests were anointed to mediate and bring the blessing of God’s forgiveness and mercy, and kings were anointed to bring the salvation of God’s overcoming victory. Those who were anointed did not have the power within themselves to accomplish God’s purpose. Unlike spoken words that die in the ears of the listener, the fragrance of the anointing oil represented the authority of the blessing or grace of the continual presence and overcoming power of the sovereign word of the personality or almighty breath or Holy Spirit of Yehovah spoken over the anointed one that continually entered in to their personality to enable them to achieve their chosen purpose and destiny in God, not their own.

It is often said “If you want something done properly, do it yourself” and in the things of God this is actually true, because of the Fall, God could not trust anyone except Himself. That is why it says in Isaiah 40:3 “A voice is crying—in a wilderness—Prepare ye the way of Yehovah, Make straight in a desert a highway to our God”. John was the voice crying in the wilderness, prepare the way for Yehovah. In His great grace, Yehovah had made great and precious promises to both Abraham and King David. Yehovah God sovereignly called Abraham out of his father’s house with the promise of the blessing of a City whose builder and foundation was God. God sovereignly gave King David the crown of the anointing of overcoming victory and made promises that a Son from David’s own body would build a temple for God’s Name and sit eternally upon the throne of His father David’s overcoming victory. Yehovah Himself was born as their son Jesus (or Yehoshua) of Nazareth, the Chosen One or Servant of Yehovah, as the heir of both Abraham’s blessing and the throne of David’s victorious anointing to guarantee the fulfilment of those promises to His Bride or brothers, the corporate City or Beloved Son of God. The City of God is a corporate body of the Sons of God headed by the man Jesus, the Divine Bridegroom who is the chief “chosen” cornerstone of Zion and who builds the City or House or Temple or Dwelling Place of the Name, personality or actual indwelling presence of Almighty God within His own “chosen” body, brothers or Bride. The word David means “beloved” and those who have been sovereignly inspired by the election of grace to practically share Jesus’ identity as the Son of God can practically share in the lamp of the light of the flames of the eternal love of the living words of God “You are My Son, the beloved in whom I delight”. Practically speaking, this is the blessing of Abraham and the anointing of King David, the word “Son of God” reunited or remarried to the breath of God’s fatherhood lost at the Fall. This is the promised land, the blessing, and the incorruptible crown of the delightful anointing that Jesus received from God when he was glorified on to the throne of his father David. This was poured out on His body or beloved Bride on the Day of Pentecost that enabled them to bear His image, testimony or witness as they continually saw an open heaven as He did and live in the presence of power where the salvation of overcoming victory was assured. That is why John says in 1 John 5:18-20 (KJV) “We know that whosoever is born of God sins not; but he that is begotten of God keeps [guards] himself, and that wicked one touches him not. And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lies in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God is come, and has given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” Jesus came as the Christ (from the Greek “Christos” or Anointed One) or Messiah (from the Latin “Messias”, from the Hebrew “Mashiyach” or Anointed One), the Son or Reflection or Image of the Living but invisible God. John said in 1 John 2:27 “But the anointing which ye have received of him abides in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it has taught you, ye shall abide in him.” Those who are inspired by the gift of God’s grace to share in His identity as the Sons of God also share in His same anointing, and therefore share in His character, behaviour, or name, and also his inheritance. That is why Paul says in Romans 8:14-17 (KJV) “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.”

It says in Matthew 3:13-17 “Then comes Jesus from Galilee upon the Jordan, unto John to be baptised by him, but John was forbidding him, saying, ‘I have need by thee to be baptised—and thou do come unto me!’ But Jesus answering said to him, ‘Suffer now, for thus it is becoming to us to fulfil all righteousness,’ then he does suffer him. And having been baptised, Jesus went up immediately from the water, and lo, opened to him were the heavens, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon him, and lo, a voice out of the heavens, saying, ‘This is My Son—the Beloved, in whom I did delight.’” In Luke 3:22 (KJV) God spoke to Jesus directly and said, “Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased”. Jesus came to John to be baptised in order to take upon himself the corporate identity of the whole of fallen mankind. Jesus was baptised in the river Jordan by John, but Yehovah anointed Jesus with a dove bodily because Jesus is the incarnation or human embodiment of Yehovah. Yehoshua of Nazareth, the servant of Yehovah was anointed by God personally for the purpose of becoming, as a man, the Ultimate Prophet, the Ultimate Priest, and the Ultimate Overcoming King. Hebraically, the baptism of Jesus was not a Trinitarian epiphany, manifesting or displaying the three distinct co-equal and co-eternal persons of the Godhead because within the ancient Hebrew culture of the Bible, there was no such thing. When Thomas said to Jesus in John 20:28 “My Lord and my God” he did not think for one moment that Jesus was God the Son. Such theological thinking belongs to a different people group, culture, age, and tradition.

The Jordan river marked the barrier between the barren wilderness of natural life and the land or “Adamah” of supernatural blessing promised by Yehovah to Abraham (see Genesis 12:3) and his true sons. The Israelites crossing of the Jordan represented them dying to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life that came from the Fall, and then living a new life in the promises and blessing of God’s fatherhood. It says in Isaiah 40:3-5 (KJV) “The voice of him that cries in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain: And the glory of the LORD (Yehovah) shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it”. At the time of Jesus, almost the whole nation was inspired by the great mercy and grace of God to come to John the Baptist to humble themselves. They picked up their crosses by humbly accepting their lot in life and confessing their secret and in some cases not so secret sins. They were then washed or cleansed by the water of the living word of God’s forgiveness symbolised by baptism in the Jordan river. In the wilderness of the pride of their hearts they had made their ways crooked and deceitful by following the ways of this world and the prince of the power of the air, the lying breaths of the devil that they naturally breathed. They had found out the hard way that the devil’s lying promise of blessing in doing things that were crooked and cursed went terribly wrong and had not brought the “shalom” of satisfied fulfilment that they had hoped for. In God-given humility they repented from the wilderness of this unbelieving-pride and determined to make their ways straight or pleasant or prosperous by trusting God to lead them by them doing what was right and true into the land of His glorious blessing. This prepared their hearts to follow Jesus and to one day receive the blessing of the same anointing that Jesus received. This was the glory of Yehovah that proceeded by His eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit from His mouth, poured out upon all flesh on the Day of Pentecost, as John had said previously about Jesus (see Luke 3:16-17) “I indeed with water do baptise you, but he comes who is mightier than I, of whom I am not worthy to loose the latchet of his sandals—he shall baptise you with the Holy Spirit and with fire; whose winnowing shovel is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his floor, and will gather the wheat to his storehouse, and the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable”. Of course, the leaders of the religious community, the Scribes, Pharisees, Priests and Teachers of the Law, had pride-poisoned puffed-up great “I am” and “as god” hearts. They had so grieved the Holy Spirit of God that God had withdrawn his blessing from their hearts completely. They believed that they needed no forgiveness because they imagined that they had kept the Law of Moses. They rejected God’s purpose for themselves and did not go to John to humble themselves, repent and be forgiven. Having rejected a relationship with God, they remained in a self-worshipping relationship with good and evil. Just like their forefathers, they chose to remain evil and they died in the twilight zone or wilderness of unbelieving-pride. One day Jesus will gather His wheat into His storehouse, but they will burn like chaff with unquenchable fire. The winnowing fork is already in His hand.

It says in Luke 4:1-2 “And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, turned back from the Jordan, and was brought in the Spirit to the wilderness, forty days being tempted by the Devil, and he did not eat anything in those days, and they having been ended, he afterward hungered”. It was not before, but after Jesus the Blessed One, was personally anointed by God that he was led by God’s almighty life’s breath or Holy Spirit to leave the promised land and go back across the Jordan to be in a lonely or private place in the wilderness to be victorious over the devil. This was not a confrontation between the devil and the person of God the Son, within ancient Hebrew culture there was no such person. God the Son belongs to a different culture, people group, tradition, and age. This was a confrontation between the chosen servant of Yehovah, the humble carpenter from Nazareth who had received the amazing grace of the superabundant victorious overcoming anointing of God’s fatherhood, and the father of lies. This perfectly humble heavenly man who bore the name Son of God by being the perfect reflection of God’s fatherhood indwelling his heart, did not live on bread alone, but upon every grace-filled word that proceeded from the mouth of God. As the heir of Abraham’s blessing and King David’s anointing he was filled to overflowing with the personality or Holy Spirit of the living words of God “you are indeed my Son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased”. The Israelites who were meant to be the sons of God lived for 40 years in the wilderness because they had failed to cross the humbling Jordan river to enter the land promised to Abraham. This was because in their “I am” puffed-up unbelieving pride they lived on bread alone and refused to establish or believe the life-changing living words that God so lovingly wanted to speak into their hearts. Instead of humbly entering God’s glorious rest (see Hebrews 3:7-19) in the lying pride of disobedient unbelief they preferred to remain enslaved to the father of lies. It says in Deuteronomy 30:14 (KJV) “But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, that thou may do it.” The whole of that generation, all except Caleb and Joshua who had been changed by the living word of God to have Jesus lookalike supernatural upstanding or resurrected hearts, being dead in their transgressions and sins, died in the wilderness of their pride-poisoned natural lives.

It says in Luke 4:3-4 (KJV) “And the devil said unto him, ‘If thou be the Son of God, command this stone that it be made bread’. And Jesus answered him, saying, ‘It is written, that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.’” Jesus knew that it was the absolute will of God to be in the wilderness where he lived for 40 days, and he became hungry. The father of lies tempted Jesus to prove that the living word of truth spoken about him personally by Almighty God “You are my Son” was untrue, by tempting him to behave unlike the Son of God, grasping equality with God and stepping outside of his Father’s will to make bread for himself. The Son can only do what he sees His Father doing and this was not pat-a-cake baking time, God was not making bread or baking cakes. In the wilderness, the Israelites had been provided with bread or “manna” from heaven to humble their hearts and teach them that they could participate in the divine nature by feeding upon the living word of God. As it says in Deuteronomy 8:3 “And He does humble thee, and cause thee to hunger and does cause thee to eat the manna (which thou hast not known, even thy fathers have not known), in order to cause thee to know that not by bread alone does man live, but by every produce of the mouth of Yehovah man does live”. Jesus knew that his Father loved him and would provide for him when the time was right. Jesus did not answer the devil by quoting scripture spoken by the natural breath of natural man. That is the realm of religious tradition. Instead, Jesus defeated the devil with the victorious God-inspired or inbreathed supernatural living word of truth that proceeded from the mouth of God by the life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God and dwelt within Jesus’ heart “It is written, ‘Man does not live on bread alone but upon every word that proceeds from the mouth of Yehovah’”.

It says in Luke 4:5-8 (KJV) “And the devil, taking him up into a high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said unto him, ‘All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it. If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine’. And Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve’” The devil tempted Jesus to step outside of his Father’s will by letting Jesus see all of the kingdoms of the world and the devil offered them to Jesus if he would bow down to, serve, and give him his authority. Jesus knew that He and his Bride would eternally inherit all things from God as his Father. He had no need to trust and trade with the father of lies in a doomed attempt to get from the devil what God had already promised that He and His Bride will receive at His second coming. Jesus defeated the father of lies with the truth of the living word of God spoken by the breath or Holy Spirit of God’s fatherhood “You shall bow down before the Lord your God and serve only Him”.

It says in Luke 4:9-12 (KJV) “And he brought him to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the temple, and said unto him, ‘If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence: For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone’. And Jesus answering said unto him, ‘It is said, thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God’”. The father of lies attempted to get Jesus to step outside of his Father’s will by suggesting that by sky-diving off the roof of the temple without a parachute this would force God into saving him and therefore win the admiration of the people. The devil promised Jesus an angelic safety net and backed it up with a pathetic attempt to wield a puny sword by quoting scripture. The devil huffed and puffed out lies but he could not blow Jesus’ house down because Jesus lived upon every living word that proceeded by the life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God from the mouth of God which was rocked within Him. Jesus’ house or personality was completely filled with God. Jesus believed and trusted in his Father implicitly, even to the point of a shameful and heart-breaking death on the cross. He had no desire whatsoever, in the pride of unbelief, to publicly partake in a dangerous display of death-defying daredevil duplicity by putting his Father to the test. Jesus silenced the father of lies with the sword of the living word of God spoken by the inspiration or breath of Holy Spirit “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test”. When Jesus had proved the almighty sovereign living word of God that dwelt within the breathings of his personality as victorious over the lies and false promises of the devil, the angels that the devil had falsely promised would prevent Jesus’ foot being dashed against a stone were sent by God to meet his physical needs, this is described in Matthew 4:11.

It says in Genesis 3:6 (KJV) “And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat”. The fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was appealing to the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh and the pride of life. These things are the deceptive tools of the devil’s lying trade. These things are the gateways of the serpent’s slithering, trading himself into people’s self-admiring hearts. These things are at the foundation of the world, and this is what the temptation of Jesus was all about. The prince of this world had slithered nothing into Jesus’ heart. Jesus said to his disciples in John 16:33 “… these things I have spoken to you, that in me ye may have peace, in the world ye shall have tribulation, but take courage—I have overcome the world”. John said in 1 John 2:15-17 (KJV) “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passes away, and the lust thereof: but he that does the will of God abides for ever”.

Those who are sovereignly inspired by the unmerited grace of God to practically share in Jesus’ corporate identity as the Sons of God do not love the world or anything in the world because they dwell within Jesus, and the Father, and His eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit, dwells within them. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life are not in the Father and so they are not within his true Sons. Those that are inspired to share in Jesus’ identity as the Son of God will practically see the heavens opened with the same eyes as Jesus saw. In the humility of their grace-humbled hearts they hear the same living words from God “You are indeed my son, the beloved whom I love” and experience the same anointing as John says in 1 John 2:27 (KJV) “But the anointing which ye have received of him abides in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teaches you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it has taught you, ye shall abide in him.” By the unmerited grace or blessing of God they become heavenly, not earthly, supernatural, and not natural, extraordinary, and not ordinary, divine, and not devilish. Their touch becomes a heavenly touch, their language a heavenly language and they see things from above and not from below. They practically experience the exact same overcoming anointing as Jesus did. They are enabled, through the sovereign grace of the mighty power of the life’s breath or Holy Spirit of God’s fatherhood, to overcome the father of lies and his pride-poisoned huffing and puffing in the private place of the wilderness of their lives. They face down the devil with the living word of God spoken with the living personality or breath or Holy Spirit of divine life, just like Jesus. He lives within them and they live within Him.

One day, having been established by grace in the anointing of Jesus’ overcoming victory and living within His resurrection life, the Sons of God will emerge victorious from their own personal wilderness into a public display of miracle working might. Through the true righteousness of being inspired by the election of grace to walk in both faith and love as He does, to the praise of His glorious grace the God of peace will crush their lying enemy repeatedly under their feet. This enables Jesus’ brothers or Bride to share in his identity by corporately becoming, together with Him, the corporate prophet, the corporate priest and the corporate overcoming and victorious king. This is how they achieve their calling, purpose and destiny in God. Through this grace-inspired living faith in the immediate present tense fragrant anointing and inbreathed supernatural living word of the personality of God they are enabled to subdue kingdoms, stand in righteousness, obtain promises, stop the mouths of lions, extinguish the power of fire, escape from the grip of their enemies, become strong in weakness, be victorious in battle and overcome all of the power of the enemy. There is nothing that they become short of when the personality of the presence of Almighty God becomes the prime mover in their thoughts, hearts and life. When God wants something doing, He has to do it Himself. God as a Father sovereignly anoints His Sons with Himself. The fragrant breath of the actual personality of God’s fatherhood proceeds by the eternal life’s breath or Holy Spirit from God into the incarnation or embodiment of the personality of His Sons. In this, the Sons of God bear the mirror image or reflection of their Father eternally indwelling their hearts. This is the way of overcoming victory. This is what it means to be anointed to overcome. Behaviour in life will become inheritance in resurrection. This is the way to inherit Sonship.

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