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The term "anointing" is a much misused and misapplied word in churches today. We speak of someone being "anointed" as they preach or "anointed as they sing" as if the anointing were a temporary thing that people step into for a moment in the Spirit. People tend to speak and think of the anointing of God as a spiritual garment that people put on for a momentary ministry. Even growing up, I was given the advice before I would sing or speak or do anything in the church, "you need to go to the prayer room and pray before service so that you will be anointed tonight." As if the anointing is something that is earned or worked up.

The advice to pray before I ministered was sound and needful, but it had nothing to do with the anointing of God. I needed to pray then and I need to pray now before I minister to ready myself to be a vessel through which God can work and to ensure that I am a clean vessel with no hidden agendas or human motives, and also to make sure that I am fully sensitive and yielded to the Spirit of God so that He can use me. But allowing myself to be completely used by the Spirit of God and being anointed are two vastly different things. Let me explain.

There are two Greek words and one Hebrew word for "anoint" in the scriptures. All three have the same basic definition: "to apply something onto a person or an animal for a particular purpose." That is essentially what "to anoint" means, and the purpose for the anointing can vary. For example, you could anoint a wound with oil or salve for the purpose of speeding up the healing process. You could also anoint yourself with water and oil as a way of bathing and refreshing yourself. Or kings would be anointed with oil for the purpose of showing that they were being called to a particular office and to hold a special authority. Priests were anointed at the beginning of their ministries with "anointing oil" to signify that God was choosing to use them to minister in His presence and for His service.

In the New Testament, this same word and concept is taken and applied to the work of the Holy Spirit in a believers life. When the Holy Spirit came in a visible anointing upon Jesus at His baptism, He was then able to go and say "the Spirit of the Lord is upon me" and then He stated the purpose for which He was anointed: to preach to the poor and set the captive free and to recover sight to the blind! It was an anointing that designated Him as ready and able and chosen to walk in a particular anointing. And just as the priests were anointed once and that forever marked them as ready for service, so did Jesus Christ only receive a visible anointing "once!"

Perhaps now you see why I say that it is foolish to pray or say that someone was anointed when they sang a particular song, because if they are called to minister to the Lord in song, then they are anointed whether they do good or not, and whether they allow themselves to be a clear channel for God's Spirit to flow through or not. What we really mean is that they were "effective" in allowing God to use them when they sang that particular song. People can be "anointed" and yet not "effective" because they had sin in their hearts, or were unprepared to minister, or were nervous, or chose the wrong message or song or whatever.

The anointing is not so much what you feel as it is a pronouncement of walking into a new level of God. If someone was anointed king, then it meant that they were meant by God to be king one day. Their life would be forever altered and changed from that day forth because the oil symbolized the Spirit of God working in their life to make it come to pass. If someone was anointed to serve as a priest, then it meant that they forever had a duty to serve in the things of God and the Spirit of God rested upon them to help them in that area. It was a permanent thing that would not be undone. Even Saul, who became a God reject, retained the authority of the office of the king because he was "God's anointed." The scriptures say that the gifts of God are without repentance and so Saul proves that it is possible to be "anointed" and ineffective for God. It is possible to be anointed and lost. The "anointing" refers to the setting aside and consecration of an individual for a particular purpose. So if we are anointed by God, then it means that we are called to walk and grow into a particular level of authority; it becomes our responsibility as to whether we do that. And it is our responsibility that when we are anointed that we do so with right motives and allow ourselves to be effective in our anointing.

It is also our responsibility not to become "God rejects" in the office of our anointing as Saul was. This is why that, for example, some song writers can leave truth and live a vile life and still be anointed and effective in leading people into the presence of God in a worship service. This is also why a televangelist can preach effectively one day the Word of God and be caught with a prostitute the next, and yet what he had to say the day before was truth and powerful. He was walking effectively in the anointing that God called him to walk and yet he was not saved because he was living after the flesh. Never make the mistake that "feeling God's presence" or "being used of God" means that everything in your life is right with God. We are right with God when we live according to His Word, not when we are anointed. There were many priests and kings in the Old Testament that were anointed but eternally lost! In salvation, the bottom line comes to obedience, not effectiveness of ministry!

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In our text, Paul wrote about the anointing that is on every Spirit-filled believer's life:

The uniqueness of the Spirit-filled believer's anointing is that the oil of the Holy Ghost is on the inside and the outside! When you receive the Spirit of God within you, then not only are you anointed on the outside in being "baptized with the Holy Ghost" but you are anointed on the inside to be used by God with both your inner thoughts and your outer actions! The Holy Spirit is an anointing of God calling us out of this world to be unique and to minister unto God! There is a scripture that we quote and often misunderstand because of the KJV English:

The phrase that is often misunderstood is "a peculiar people." Today peculiar means "weird," "strange," or "odd." Perhaps that is how the people of the world often look at totally devoted Christians but that is not what was intended by the scripture here. The word peculiar used to mean, and the Greek word here means, "to belong to one person only." When Peter writes that we are a "peculiar people" what he means is that we "belong to God alone." We are "His possession" to do what He wants.

And so we are unique and different from this world because of the anointing of the Spirit of God on our lives! God has called us to minister before Him! He has sent the anointing of His Spirit to call us to service in His ways! When you have received the Holy Ghost, you have been set apart to do God's will. You are no longer your own possession, but belong to God Almighty for Him to do what He will! We tend to forget that being anointed means that we belong to someone else's purpose!

It's still your choice as to obey, but understand the calling is an automatic thing! If you have received the Holy Ghost you have been consecrated and set apart in order to do God's will. Therefore you will never have the void of your life fulfilled until you fulfill what He has called you to do! God "has anointed us, but it is our choice as to whether or not we press into and receive the fullness of what that anointing means!

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A person is only officially anointed with the Holy Spirit once in their life and I understand that. They may need it renewed or refilled, but the original consecration and calling is still there. But with all that we have learned in mind, I want to turn your attention to the example of David, the foremost character of the Old Testament. David, you may remember, is someone that in many ways we want to copy because he was known as "a man after God's own heart!" With the exception of his committing adultery and murder, his life is something that we should want to emulate and the Bible records it in detail so that we can do so!

What I want to draw your attention to, is the "anointings" of David's life, of which there are three or four depending on how you count. Remember that as far as receiving a call of God to be king, there is really only "one anointing" here, but these three or four different instances of anointings represent the gradual receiving of the fullness that God had called David to have. In other words, there was one anointing on David's life, but his actually receiving the fullness of what God had promised came in four steps. If we are to be a "man or woman after God's own heart," then like David we too must grow in these steps of God's anointing and allow the Holy Ghost to come upon us again for each step.

We read of the first anointing upon David's life in our other text. Saul had become a God reject and would have to one day be replaced. In 1 Samuel 16, the prophet Samuel went to Jesse's house and asked that his sons be brought before him one by one and that one of them would be blessed. Jesse started with his firstborn, tall and strong, and then passed all of the other eldest boys before the prophet. To the daddy and the prophet these boys looked like good men to lead Israel, but God spoke to Samuel and said:

Samuel then asked Jesse, "do you have any other sons" and Jesse confessed that his youngest, David, was out tending the sheep. When David was brought before the prophet the scriptures say:

This first anointing of God brought the guidance and the power of the Spirit into David's life, and it is a type of the infilling of the Holy Spirit in our life today. As our text said, when we receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, then we are anointed by God for His service and purpose! It comes automatically. It signals the beginning of us walking close day in and day out with God's Spirit!

But let me point out a couple of things about this first anointing of David:

First, David had been chosen to be king of Israel since before He was born. The scriptures say that God has a plan for us and a calling for us before we are even formed in our mother's womb (see Jeremiah 1:5). So what was happening here was not the beginning of the calling of God on David's life, but the revealing of that calling to David, himself. God had intended for David to be king before David ever drew his first breath, but the anointing was God's way of informing David of His plans!

You see, God had a plan for your life before you ever entered this world, but you only became fully aware that He did when you were first anointed by the Holy Spirit! God created you to live for Him and to do His will, but the Holy Spirit was just informing you of this intentions!

So if you don't know, then let me tell you again, if you have the Holy Spirit then that is proof that you are anointed to do something great for God! God has a specific will for you life! God has a special place of authority and power in His kingdom for you. It's been there all along, but when you received the anointing of the Holy Spirit, God made you aware that there was a special calling on your life. And now that you have realized that, you can never go back to living an ordinary life! Because, like David, you are marked to rule and reign with Him! You have been marked by the anointing of God!

But the second point that I want to make about David's anointing is where our understanding breaks down. David was anointed by Samuel to be king, but it would be years before he would actually possess the throne. In fact, David would be tested by being given the opportunity to take the throne from Saul and David passed the test by refusing to kill God's anointed. David was anointed to be king but he would endure much before he ever held the golden scepter or had the crown upon his head!

Understand what the scripture is teaching us here: When you receive the first anointing of the Holy Ghost, then you are selected and called and it is revealed to you that God has a special power and authority for you to walk within. But like David, you must grow to the place where you can handle that authority and power without it destroying you. You've got to mature before you can gain the throne. You've got to kill a giant that rears it's head in your life. You've got to endure people hurting you and be faithful in the ups and downs of your life. You've got to tend the sheep faithfully and fight off a bear and a lion. You have been anointed to one day be great in the Spirit, but, like David, you must grow into that anointing!

The full anointing of God in your life is not something that you earn by praying two hours before you get up and speak or sing. It is something that is matured into by being faithful even when it seems like all hell is fighting against you. It is something that you must grow into so that it will not destroy you. When I got the Holy Spirit, God called me to do something in the ministry. I wasn't fully aware of it, but I was aware that God had a plan for my life. I didn't yet know that it would be pastoring, but imagine if God would have put me in the full position of pastor at 9 or 10 years of age! The anointing was there, but I had to mature and respond to adversity in the right way for me to grasp what God had promised.

Too many people receive the Holy Spirit and are anointed by God for a particular purpose, and then never are faithful through the everyday trials of life and therefore remove themselves from ever being able to grasp the throne of what God intended for them. What if David had ran from the lion and the bear? What if David had hidden from the giant? What if David would have taken matters in his own hands and killed Saul and tried to fulfill God's will in David's timing rather than God's? What if he had never ran from cave to cave and had to learn how to take losers and turn them into winners?

I say to you that if David had shirked being faithful in the small things, he would have never been given the opportunity to take the throne of Israel despite the initial anointing of God. Because God will not put more on us than we can bear. And so most people that never realize their potential in God don't because they failed to see that the trials of today are there to mold us and strengthen us into becoming mighty enough to handle God's purpose and anointing for our lives, without it destroying us! Your everyday reactions to life and situations has more to do with your future in God than you realize!

The second anointing of David was by the tribe of Judah and we read of it in this verse:

This anointing made David king, but not of all of Israel, but only over the tribe of Judah. His first step to receiving the fullness of what God has promised was to receive a part of a fulfillment of God's promises.

So it is with us who have been anointed by God's Spirit. God first gives us a part of what has been promised before He allows us to have all of what He has said. When you get the Holy Spirit, you will not become everything that God said that you would become instantly, but after a time of testing and growth, you will receive part of the fulfillment. There is a specific reason for this:

That David was anointed first by the men of "Judah" is not accident because "Judah" means "praise." God wants to see if you will praise Him for a part of His blessings before He will give you all of it. God checks our spirit and motives to see what we will do with a partial possession of our anointing. You think you are called to be Sunday School director, but how are you doing just teaching a class every few months? God has called you to be a soul winner and pray thousands through to the Holy Ghost, but right now He has just given you one person to teach a Bible Study to and is watching to see how you react to them! God has called you to be a mighty speaker in the church, but how are you doing with cleaning the bathrooms? What is your attitude toward the part that God has given you?

Some people grumble and do a halfhearted job and get mad at God because He doesn't hand them the full kingdom when they have paid some of the price. But why don't you be like David and embrace the partial with Judah! Why don't you praise God for the portion! If God has healed part of the way, then rejoice in it! If God has called you to be a soulwinner, then thank God for the one that came to church when you invited them! Instead of getting down that you haven't seen the thousands, why don't you rejoice and praise God over the partial! If God is healing your marriage in small increments, why don't you acknowledge that and rejoice in it instead of being mad at Him for not fixing everything instantly! It took you years to mess your life up good, and maybe God is doing a gradual work as a test to see if you are truly trusting Him! Could it be that God is testing you to see if your motives and Spirit is right!? To see if you are fully trusting in Him regardless of what things look like!?

David's third anointing was his being:

He finally got it! He finally reached where everything that God had promised was really his. But this is because David refused to become satisfied with just a part of God's will. Some people are satisfied with just having a small part of what God has promised them. How hungry are you for the things of God? Are you hungry enough that you will not settle for anything less than the fullness of what God has for you?

Some people are just satisfied with a partial healing, a partial ministry, or a partial touch. And I think God sometimes gives the partial first, just to see how hungry you are for the fullness of what He has to offer! I want to be like the one leper who left the other nine and came back and was made whole! I want to be like the man who was touched again by Jesus to receive! Understand that God often entrusts you with a part before the whole, but don't fall into the trap of being satisfied with a small portion. I want to be like Elisha and ask God for a "double portion!" But some of us are satisfied with the crumbs from the master's table. If we are born again, then we are not the dogs, but the children of the master! It's time to realize that we have been called to sit at the table and receive the fullness of what God has for us!

Too many people get used to being king over Judah only, that they forget that God anointed them to be king over Israel! You can get so caught up in praising God for the partial blessing and the small things -- and we need to do that -- but we can get so caught up in serving God in the partial that we forget that God really is going to give us the full! Some people get so used to living without the complete fullness that they become convinced that the day of fullness will never come. But I've got news for you: keep being faithful and paying the price and serving God no matter what and the day of full fulfillment of His anointing will come sooner than you think! It's closer now in some of your lives, than many of you can even see!

A preacher told a true story of a man in the gold rush days of California. This man sold everything that he had to go "strike it rich." For decades, the man labored digging a mine shaft into the earth, believing everyday that he was going to "hit the big one!" The weeks turned to months and the months to years and the years to decades. Finally as an old man, the miner got frustrated and disillusioned and angered that he had wasted his whole life trying to strike the mother lode, that he one day threw his pick down and walked into town and sold the entire claim to a major mining firm for a fraction of what it was worths. The firm went in and inspected the site and the mine shaft that the old man had dug and decided to keep on digging. The next day, they were shocked to find that the man had been two inches from one of the largest veins of gold discovered in the state! He had quit, two inches from receiving his dream!

So let me remind you that God fully intends for you to have the fullness of His anointing! Just don't quit! Maybe you've only received a part of what God has promised, but don't despair and don't stop, because you are closer than you think!

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And so we come to the final thought of the evening. Most scholars would tell you that David only had three anointings in his life, and in the sense of someone else anointing him, that is true. But we do find the word used again in David's life. And that is that:

It is after David has made the mistake of his life with Bathsheba. It is after he has been confronted by the man of God. It is after he has reaped the judgment of God for his sin in the death of his child. It is at the time when David was the most discouraged and disillusioned that he had ever been. It was on the lowest points of David's life. Yet we find this:

He "anointed himself!" You see, in life and living for God even at the level of having possessed everything that God has promised, there is going to come a time where you have reached a low point and you have gotten sidetracked and maybe sin has tried to get you out of God's will or maybe your spirit is so low that you have even considered walking out and giving up the fight.

But in times like that, is when you have to "re-anoint" yourself by standing up and reminding yourself of every promise that God has ever given you. You have to re-anoint yourself by reminding yourself of how faithful that God has been! You've got to as David did "encourage yourself in the Lord" even if there is nobody else around to do it! You are not proclaiming anything about yourself except what God had done, but every now and then you will need to remind yourself of those things!

And so I'm preaching to you tonight, when the devil begins to say "You are not worthy," you need to remind yourself "I'm not worthy, but I was anointed and called of God, so my lack of worthiness does not matter!" When the devil says, "it won't happen and there is no use," you need to re-anoint yourself by reminding yourself of the calling of God in your life and remember that you do matter and you are important and you are powerful and you do have a purpose or God would have never filled you with His Spirit! Like David, you are going to have move on from the grieving and the down and out stage and anoint yourself in the Lord and move on to being what God has called you to be! In order to have the fullness of God's anointing in our lives, we will have to at time anoint ourselves and stand in faith believing that "it may be a down time in my life now, but when I am tried, I will come forth as pure gold!" God has not forsaken you or left you alone: pick your head up, and wash yourself spiritually, and trust God completely again! "David, it's time to anoint yourself!"

Wherever you are in the cycle of life, and wherever you are in God's timing, trust God for the next step! If you need to receive the initial anointing of the Holy Ghost, then it's not just for a select few but for those who will yield themselves to Him! If you have the Holy Ghost, it's time to walk into being everything that God wants you to be. If you have received part of God's promises, praise God for it! But don't be satisfied with it until you receive the fullness of His anointing! And if you are walking in where God wants you to be, and things haven't turned out quite like you expected, then it's time to anoint yourself as David did! Whatever you do, refuse to sell yourself short and partake of the fullness of God's anointing!