Surviving the Anointing — Shane Idleman

Last week we talked about a very interesting topic. If you were here, you remember what that was. If you weren't here, I would encourage you to go back and listen to last week's message. We talked about understanding the, you ready for the word?

Understanding and Embracing the Anointing

The anointing. Understanding the anointing. And that word makes some people cringe and it makes other people leap for joy. What's the difference? Because they've experienced it. They've experienced the anointing of God, that filling of God's presence.

And they want more of that. And we also try to, I don't wanna go over last week again, but we try to find the balance. It's not about, being anointed by God simply means that you've surrendered your life to God, completely, for the most part, fully surrendered your life, and the Holy Spirit now is governing your life.

And the definition is this, the authority and the ability to perform God's will with supernatural strength. Creo, creo is what it means in the Greek, anointed. To perform God's will with anointing and with strength.

And you who've been there know exactly what I'm talking about. And when the anointing's there or when it's not, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Church is dead, the Bible's dead, and many people live in that state.

And it's interesting, Christ was called Christos, Christos, C-H-R-I-S-T-O-S, Christos, which was the anointed one. He was coming, he was the anointed one. Remember, we talked about the Spirit of the Lord is upon me, upon me.

He's anointed me to preach the gospel, to set captives free. So actually, the anointing is nothing to be scared of. It's something to be embraced. And when this filling of the Holy Spirit comes, when you're filled with the love of God, the joy of God, sometimes joy is a byproduct.

You're just excited for the things of God. Have you ever got up in the morning and wanted to read the Bible and couldn't wait? That's a good thing. And wanted to get to church, wanted to worship, because the Spirit of God is working in your life.

But, but the enemy hates the anointing. He does not want people anointed with the Spirit of God. And I believe that once God saves you, he seals you with the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit's given to you as a guarantee.

Both quoting Ephesians, I believe, from Paul's letters. The Holy Spirit is given as a guarantee. And he seals us until the day of redemption, is the exact wording. So the enemy knows, okay, this person's saved, but I'm gonna knock them off track.

I'm gonna stop that, because the enemy's worried about the anointing. The anointing is the power of God working in your life. So when you pray with the anointing, much different than when you just pray.

You're praying with the anointing, you're going to work in the anointing, you're in your marriage in the anointing, your family, fathers could lead their children in the anointing. It makes all the difference in the world.

So the enemy is going after this calling of God, this filling of the Holy Spirit to sidetrack you and sidetrack me from what he's called us to do. I mean, is that the goal of a lion who goes about seeking whom he may devour?

That's exactly what he does. He goes after the anointing of God on your life. And you know, the people that can relate to this sermon, if you can't relate, that's why I'm preaching it. I'm trying to get that heart into the right spot to where you can be filled with God's Spirit mightily.

And everything changes. The Bible comes alive. Worship comes alive. Church comes alive. You want more of God. You just can't seem to get enough of God. That's healthy. That's being filled with the Spirit.

And those of you who know that, you also know that as the filling of the Holy Spirit increases, guess what else increases? Temptation. I mean, in my 20s, I thought I was a really good person. I'm a nice guy.

And now you see like, my motives can be tarnished. My attitude can be tarnished. The enemy uses everything. Temptations everywhere because that's how he kills the anointing, quite honestly. He throws the bait out there.

You take the bait and draws us away from God's anointing. So I want to talk tonight about surviving the anointing. And I can't take credit for that title. It's actually a book that David Ravenhill wrote.

He's the son of Leonard Ravenhill. I don't know if you remember Leonard Ravenhill back in the 1960s, 70s, 80s. I would encourage you to read this book, Surviving the Anointing. And it talks about this whole aspect of how the enemy comes in certain areas of our life.

But I'm gonna use it springboarding off of what we talked about last week. And when I talk about the anointing, do you want to be filled with the Spirit of God? Do you truly want the Bible to come alive?

Do you truly want worship to penetrate your heart? Do you want to be this love overflowing? The Puritans used to write of this unspeakable joy of when God finally fills us with the Spirit and you're breathing, you're eating God.

Not that you're so heavenly minded that you're no earthly good. I don't even believe in that statement. The more heavily minded you can be, often the most earthly good you are. I don't think you can have enough of God.

Now we can get off into weirdness, you know, and just, oh, I'm so spiritual, I'm just gonna pray all week and not do anything, not serve, not, you can kind of float into this, you know. But I'm talking about people who are just filled with God's Spirit, who want the anointing on their life, whatever area of a service, whatever area of service.

But I'll remind you again that the anointing comes with a cost. There is a price. When Jesus says, die to yourself, carry your cross, follow me, how many people do you think actually do that? I mean, I don't do it perfectly, and nobody does it perfectly.

I mean, you would be Jesus if you did that perfectly. But if we think about what it requires to be filled with the Spirit of God, it requires saying no to self, it requires saying no to many of our addictions, it requires saying no to many of our attitudes, it requires saying no, I can't go there, I can't do those things because it draws me away from God.

Dying to self, not having to win every argument, and wanting to have peace in the home, wanting to empty myself, Lord, I empty myself, everything is yours, my checkbook, my finances, my marriage, this church, Lord, everything is yours.

There's a cost to walking in the anointing, and it's a cost that very few people want to pay. This is a shoot you straight service, right? I have to hide some of this stuff from the first service. They can't take it.

I'm kidding, of course. But there's a price to pay, there's a price. You won't look like the world. You won't look like other Christians, and on this note, the anointing makes all the difference in the world.

Here's where I think a lot, do you ever go on Facebook, or do you ever, whatever it is, and you say, how can Christians do that? I don't want to fill in the blank, because you can fill it in. You know, there's a big divide in our country right now.

There's this, and you say, how can Christians watch that, or how can they fill their mind? How? The Spirit of God is not in them. The Spirit of God is not in them. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, the world is in them.

And that's why they look like the world. Anytime you go the same direction as Hollywood is going, you're not filled with the Holy Spirit. I'm not even gonna apologize for that statement. Anytime you're going towards the direction of the world, the Holy Spirit is not guiding you.

Because the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God. The Spirit of the world is anti-Christ, against God. So it's going this way. So when Christian, spirit-filled believers are going this way, and they go, I can't believe other Christians, that's why.

They're not filled with the Spirit, they're filled with the world. So that's why there's a big divide on a lot of different issues. And you can look at people and say, how can they do that? How can they watch that?

How can they conduct their life that way, day in and day out? I'm not talking about perfection, right? We're making that clear. But you know, there's just a different lifestyle, complete different lifestyle.

And actually, they wanna avoid you and your lifestyle. Because you live a certain way. Oh, snooty two-shoes, goody two-shoes, teetotaling, I mean, what are all the terms? You guys know. Holy rollers, you know, all this stuff.

They don't wanna be around you because you bring that Spirit of God into the whole relationship. So there's a difference. And that's why there's a lot of differences with Christians. Some are, a Christian, in the Word of God, filled with the Spirit of God, loving God, living for God, on fire for God, and a person who's not, they're not gonna see through the same lens.

About anything. They're probably not gonna vote for the same person. No pun intended, right? They're probably not gonna go to the same places. That's why there's a division. It's not judgmentalism and arrogance.

It's being filled with the God Spirit. There's a difference, there's a distinction. And the anointing makes all the difference in the world. So let's get into this. Surviving the anointing. And this is interesting.

We are given this gift. To me, this is a wonderful gift. If you sit, I thought about this yesterday when we were up in the mountains, I took a little walk. I was walking, and God says, when you believe on me, I'm going to give you my Spirit.

My Spirit, and people, they're probably New Age or, you know, atheists are like, oh, man, Christians are way out there on this point. God says, his Spirit is gonna fill you. I'm gonna fill you with my Spirit.

My Spirit is going to live inside of you and cry, Abba, Father. He's gonna guide you, he's gonna lead you, he's gonna comfort you, he's going to empower you, he's gonna be with you, but you can quench and grieve that Spirit.

So when you sit and think that the very Spirit that raised Christ from the dead, God's Holy Spirit, the presence of God is actually in the believer. I mean, that would change the way you live. You would think that alarm clock, ding, ding, ding, don't go there, don't go there, change.

I mean, this Holy Spirit's such a wonderful gift. I don't know if too many Christians who make a terrible decision go, I had no clue. I didn't know that was gonna hurt my marriage. I didn't know that was gonna lead to financial ruin.

I didn't know that was gonna, I didn't know that would put me in jail. I had no idea and no clue. The truth is we have a lot of clues. Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, don't go there, don't go, the warning system, the Holy Spirit convicting and saying, don't do that, don't do that, don't do that, don't do that.

So God's residing in a believer. And here's the interesting thing. You can spark that Holy Spirit residing in you. When Paul says, be filled with the Spirit, first he says, do not be drunk with wine, what is debauchery, but be led by a different spirit.

Be filled with the Spirit, it's a word, it's an active tense, it's an ongoing being filled with the Holy Spirit. So as you continue to fill yourself with God's Spirit, the hunger and the desire for God increase and increase and increase and you're filled with God and filled with God and love the things of God, but as that Spirit is quenched and grieved, you want less to do with God.

That's why many Christians will walk away. It's not God. It's never God, ever. It's what we do with the gift that's been given to us. The Holy Spirit and this anointing, this filling of God is a wonderful gift.

It's basically God saying, how full of me do you wanna be? That's why I often say, you have all of the Holy Spirit that you'll ever need, but how much of him, or how much of you does he have? We have all of the Holy Spirit, all of him.

I don't think in a couple years from now, you'll get a little more. In a couple years, you'll get a little more. The Holy Spirit is there, but how much of you does he have? How much of your life does he have?

Because the more you give up, the hardest one I'll tell you right now is the checkbook. That's the hardest one, that's the last one to go. I'm not gonna give him that part of my life because he might just make me do what?

Do what? Be led of the Spirit? And then we don't wanna give him certain relationships that we just, well, I know that's my one little vice, but can I, no. Give me all. To the degree you surrender is to the degree you're filled.

You wanna know how filled you can be with the Holy Spirit. How much of your life are you willing to surrender? The more you surrender, the more you're filled. The less you give up, the less you're filled.

So that's why you have a lot of Christians walking around, and Paul would say they're carnal nature, because they're not being led of the Spirit, they're being led of the flesh because they're holding on to all those things, and they're not giving them over to God.

So it's a, in my opinion, it's a wonderful gift. I mean, can you imagine just having nothing of God in us? It's like, well, I hope my willpower's good this week. I mean, I gotta read this thing, it sure is boring.

And it's just, I don't even, it's just, all this is dead. I mean, it's just nothing. Sadly, that's how most Christians live. What I just described is the life for most Christians, because they're not, they're not experiencing that abundant life that Christ spoke of.

Jesus Christ is not a liar. When he says, if you believe on me, as the scriptures say, out of your belly will flow rivers of living water. Now, those are conditions he meant for true disciples. He's assuming if you die to yourself, if you follow me, if you pick up your cross like his initial disciples did, once you believe in him, you give up, because when you believed in Jesus back then, you were ostracized, you were criticized, you were removed from the temple, it was true, it was true, genuine conversion.

Nowadays, people are like, yeah, I think I'll try Jesus out, like you try in that burger. Yeah, I mean, what's wrong with, I mean, it can't hurt. You don't try Jesus out. That's what, when Jesus said, if you believe in me, truly believe, and repent, and fill with the spirit, you will have rivers of living water.

Not all the time, but as you seek God, the more you seek him, the more you find him. The more you find him, the more you seek him. There's a diligence there. There's a discipline there. Whoever came up with five-minute devotionals, they're good, now and then, but that's not gonna cut it in these dire times.

Five minutes, you just gave Hannity, and O 'Reilly, and Fox News three hours, and you're gonna give God five minutes. You just gave Facebook two hours, and you're gonna give God, see, that's why people aren't filled with the spirit.

Including, this can happen to me. If I get on that slippery soap of Facebook, the media, Twitter, sleeping a lot, doing this, just getting back into the world, and back into this, and let's go watch all these movies, and let's do this, and just getting away from God, that spiritual power, that boldness will leave.

And then what's funny is you don't get humble, you start getting defensive. When God's spirit begins to leave you, you don't go home, oh, Lord, I need you back. You start going, no, you're judgmental.

You're Mr. Holy Roller, you're prideful, you're arrogant. And you begin to, because you don't want conviction. As you're, when a person's drifting from God, the last thing they want is conviction. They avoid that like the plague.

But somebody filled with the spirit, they know exactly what I'm talking about. There's a difference there. And you also know some people, I've talked about this topic before at men's conferences, and you'll see guys just, I mean, they'll start crying.

And just, after I ask them afterwards, and they say, man, I had that 10 years ago, and they start reminiscing. Just, I remember one guy, man, their stories are powerful. And I remind them, but you can be right there again.

Right there. And nine times out of 10, they don't want to give up something. The cost is too great. The cost is too great. But is it really? So that's what the anointing is. It's this wonderful gift of God.

Samuel, Saul, and the Cost of Losing the Anointing

And I want to show how it's used in 1 Samuel 16. Now, the Lord said to Samuel, and Samuel is a great prophet of God. He was raised under a priest named Eli. And his whole life, this man walked in the anointing of God.

But God rebuked him right here. He said, now, the Lord said to Samuel, how long will you mourn for Saul, seeing that I have rejected him over Israel? And something I thought of at the first service, right before I was going over this message, it's not even my notes, but I'm wondering how many of us are mourning over our past and not moving forward?

How many of us are looking at our past and not moving forward, or caught, if you would? We're caught in this past, and the walls we build to protect us end up imprisoning us. And we're caught in this past.

It's almost like God's saying, how long are you gonna mourn over that? How long are you gonna look back to that? How long are you gonna allow that to keep you in bondage? This would be a great thing to tell 12-step programs and celebrate recovery and act.

Don't live in your past of regret. Yes, you've lost a great deal, but God wants to get back on track. Don't live in the past, and don't allow the past to keep influencing you. So he rebuked Samuel. How long will you mourn for Saul, seeing that I have rejected him from reigning over Israel?

Last week, we talked about Saul was a king. God rejected him. You might say, well, that's pretty harsh. Well, no, Saul kept rejecting God. This is that famous passage we talked about earlier last week where God says that I desire mercy, not sacrifice, for rebellion is as a sin of witchcraft.

So he was rebelling against God, and God said, okay, I've had enough. I'm rejecting you as king. So God told Samuel to fill your horn with oil and go. I'm sending you to Jesse, the Bethlehemite, for I have provided myself a king among his sons.

So God says, get this guy Saul out of the way. I've anointed, I've called somebody else to be king. So Samuel did what the Lord said. Contrast that with Saul. Saul did not do what the Lord said. Samuel did what the Lord said and continued to walk in God's anointing.

Saul didn't do what God said and lost his anointing. Very interesting parallel. And the elders of the town trembled at his coming. And they said, do you come peaceably? And he said, yes, I've come to sacrifice.

Sanctify yourselves and come with me to the sacrifice. Then he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice. So it was when they came that he looked at Eliad. He looked at Eliad and said, surely the Lord's anointed is before him.

But the Lord said to Samuel, do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees, for the Lord looks at outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.

Wow, there's a lot right there. But the first thing I wanna pull out of this is number one point, boldness always follows the anointing. Boldness always, there's no way around it. You can try to skip around it because you're not a bold person, but it will follow.

When somebody's anointed by God, there's a boldness. There's a spiritual authority. Doesn't have to be mean or rebuking, but there's a boldness, there's a confidence there because you're going in God's anointing.

So did you hear what this said? The people trembled when they say, Samuel, do you come peaceably? Why? Because he's been anointed of God. This is a mighty man of God, a prophet of God coming. And the people are like, oh no.

They're trembling because the anointing brings boldness. That's a byproduct. And they say, well, that's okay for you, Shane. You need it. Well, no, so do you. A mom with boldness? A father with a little bit of boldness and a lot less passivity?

Somebody, when you're at work, here's what happens all the time, all the time without the Holy Spirit, without the anointing. You're at work. Oh, you're a Christian? Yeah. Well, why is this, I don't know, I don't know.

I don't know, I don't know. Just, I don't know. Go talk to my pastor. Well, you Christians are always doing, I don't know. I can't answer. I have no, you know, well, the Bible says something. Oh, the Bible's written by men and it did this and the Catholic Church changed this and like, oh, I didn't know that.

And there's this timidity. But when a person is filled with the anointing of God, they can say, no, you're wrong. You're wrong. Here's why. Scripture's crystal clear. Truth is crystal clear. You're wrong.

I love you, but you're wrong. But so it's a backing down. It's a backing down. And that's why you're seeing in the culture this push, push, push on the church. The church is cowering down. We don't wanna offend.

We don't wanna upset. We don't wanna hurt anybody. And they think love is this turn the other cheek, passive form of Christianity that never hurts, never offends. Let me remind you that Jesus walked into the temple.

He drove them out with boldness. He told the religious leaders, you whitewashed tombs. You're dead on the inside. They said that no man ever spoke like this man. Were they talking about his passivity?

When the Bible says no man ever spoke like this man, were they talking about his gentle, quiet demeanor, which thank God for it? Or were they talking about his boldness? He would tell the religious leaders, oh, you don't even know what you're talking about.

You're sons of Satan. What? Religious leaders. He said, you travel land and sea, and when you win one convert, you make him twice as son of hell as you. You try that next time to the next pastor you know.

Go to a pastor who doesn't wanna talk about anything controversial. And you say, you are leading people astray. You are not filled with the spirit of God. That takes a lot of guts. I'm not re-recommending you do that.

But that's where boldness comes from. You're able to defend a position, but lovingly, lovingly. Because actually, I truly believe that when we cower down and back away, that's not being filled with the spirit.

That's being a coward. And by default, my nature wants to do that. You want me to be transparent tonight? People think I just get a kick out of preaching like this. If God didn't call me to do it, I wouldn't be doing this.

I'd be everybody's friend. My mom would tell you he's a people pleaser. I wanna be a motivational speaker, not upset anybody. Isn't that good, right? Everybody leave here, yay, yay, yay, that was good.

That's the truth. My flesh wants to please everybody. My flesh, I don't wanna argue, I don't wanna debate, I don't wanna call out things. I don't wanna say this is wrong in God. But when you're filled with God's spirit, it's like, oh, oh, Jeremiah, his word is in my heart like a lamb that's went to sleep.

His word is in my heart like a burning fire. It's shut up in my bones. I'm worried of holding it back, but I cannot. I've gotta speak his truth. They were beaten, disciples were beaten. They said, stop talking about Jesus.

They said, we can't, we can't. Why can't they? Because they're filled with the spirit of God. So boldness is directly related to being filled with the spirit of God. So when somebody confronted recently Joel Osteen why he doesn't say anything bad and upset people, he said, well, I'm not called to do that.

When you're not called to be a pastor then, I'll tell you that right now. You're called to be a motivational speaker. Because boldness is a byproduct. Shane, don't be mean, I'm not being mean, I'm being honest.

I'm being as honest as I can. When pastors in our culture say, we don't talk about sin, we don't talk about repentance, we don't talk about judgment, we don't talk about the sins that are gonna make people feel bad, then I say, you're not a pastor.

You're a motivational speaker. And you need to resign and go do something different then. Because I can stand before God and say that. I guarantee it. When Paul says, Timothy, preach the word. What's the word mean?

Just the good things? No, it doesn't. Preach the word. How do you know it doesn't mean just the good things, Shane? Because he goes on to say, the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.

Meaning, they don't like difficult truths. Everybody likes God is love. Everybody. Everybody. Tell me somebody who doesn't, God's just love, do whatever you want. Everybody loves that God. But when he said, Timothy, preach the truth.

Be ready in and out of season because the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. They will not like difficult things. But you must convince, you must rebuke. What? Rebuke? Yeah. Exhort.

All these things. That's what the scripture does. See, here's the wonderful thing about the Bible. It doesn't, you don't fall in love with the word of God and fall in love with God until you repent and you're convicted of the sin you're doing.

So in order to have a deep, meaningful relationship with the God of love, I have to first see the God of wrath. Because the God of love makes no sense unless you see the wrath of God. Think about this for a minute.

If Jesus, who spoke more about hell than on heaven, Jesus, turn the other cheek, Jesus, spoke more about hell than he did on heaven. And we paint, when Jesus, okay, not Shane, Jesus paints hell as outer darkness, weeping and gnashing of teeth, where the fire never goes out.

When he paints this picture of eternal torment, separation from God for eternity, and then he says, but the grace of God do you think I love God's grace more now? Or when I just say, oh, it's a God of love, a God of grace, whatever you want to do, it's like, you know, whatever.

You have to, you can only appreciate the good news with that bad news as a backdrop. When I was born, when I came out of the womb in Courtsill, California, I was hell bent, like ACDC song, I'm on a highway to hell.

That's where I was going. By default, I was going there. God says, because of my love, because of my grace, because of my mercy, I sent my son to die for you. Just repent and believe. And then once you do that, the grace of God is precious.

So we don't mock the grace of God. We love the grace of God, but you have to understand it with the bad news as a backdrop. You think you would see the stars if the night wasn't so black? How many stars can you see when the sun's out?

Everybody's going, oh, zero. Why? Same thing. That's why Christians love God's love so much. That's why I laugh when people say, oh, you just don't know God's love. Oh, brother, you have never been more misled in your whole life.

I love God's love, but it's because of God's love I have to tell you the other side of the story. We have to tell you the difficult things. So this God of love that just allows people to do whatever they want, when they want, to who they want, this God of love we've created is a God who allows us to continue in our sin.

That's not a God of love. A God of love would never allow somebody to continue in their sin and parade it around. It's called blasphemy. It's called mocking God. Very dangerous spot to be. So don't ever question people that we love the grace of God, the power of God.

We love that side of Him because we understand the other side. That's the difference. So boldness is always a characteristic. You will not see in all of scripture timidity being somebody filled God's spirit.

Actually, you'll see Gideon timid until he was filled with the spirit. You'll see David timid until he was filled with the spirit. You'll see Samson timid until he was filled with the Holy Spirit. You'll see Peter warming himself by a fire that denied Christ three times.

And then when he was filled with the spirit, you couldn't shut him up. He was beaten, he was imprisoned, he was martyred. What was the difference? He's warming himself by the fire. Oh, you're with him, Jesus.

No, no, no, your speech betrays you. You're a Galilean, you're with him. No, no, I wasn't. And he cursed the lady. Timidity, timidity. And the Bible talks about the great falling away that you are actually seeing right before your eyes.

These are timid, this timidity. We don't wanna confront anything. Let the culture, let the courts, let everybody just push everything on us and timid. We don't care. So that boldness is always, always a byproduct of the anointing.

Now, here's the key. It's gotta be underscored with love. When you take boldness with love, that's Christ. When you take love away, that's just a mean, Bible-thumping Pharisee. But when you take the boldness away, and it's all love, you're a coward.

I will tell you right now, a person that is afraid to talk about the truth of God's word is a coward. They're not filled with the Spirit of God. And I can say that, because I am one. If I'm not filled with the Spirit, I'm the biggest baby you've ever seen.

I don't wanna upset, I don't wanna upset, I don't wanna upset anybody. That's what the flesh, the flesh wants to be liked. It wants to be loved by everybody. And we cave into these certain issues. But succumbing to fear and cowardliness quenches and grieves the Spirit.

That's the one thing I wanted to get to. When we're confronted with things, when we cave in to fear, we cave in to being cowards. When we cave in to saying nothing, we quench and grieve the Spirit, because He wants us to, He wants the boldness of the boldness.

There's nothing wrong with Jesus being compared to a lion. There's nothing wrong with Jesus being compared to a warrior. Remember, John in Revelation saw heaven open, and on a white horse he's riding, and out of his mouth is going to come a sword that he strikes the nations, and he'll rule the nations with a rod of iron, and he himself will tread the winepress and fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.

Why don't you put that on the screen next time, Mr. Olsteen? I mean, think, where's the boldness? Where's the truth of what God's Word says? It's a byproduct, so fear and backing away quenches and grieves the Spirit.

Now, I'm not, this is a huge disclaimer, as big as this banner. This does not mean we go forward and become jerks, and we tell everybody off. One reason before my articles go public, one reason I send them to you, and one reason I send them to my mom, is so she takes off all those little, hmm, you might wanna say that differently.

Might wanna bring you a little bit more love. You might wanna, you know, you season it with grace. Season it with grace, and it's boldness. That's why most people don't like what I'm saying, to be honest with you.

They don't like the boldness and the conviction in your face. They don't like the, in your face, leave me alone. And you ever thought of this, that darkness loves the darkness. It hates the light. So when you bring the light in, the hating, conviction, get away from me.

And it convicts people, doesn't it? When you're bold for Christ, it convicts people. When you're bold for Christ, watch how many friends stick by you. When you say, I'm not doing that anymore, I'm living my life for Christ, are they gonna go, you know what, that's so awesome, me too.

Nope. It's called either unfollow or unfriend. Trust me, I've unfollowed about 300 people, they just don't know it, because I'm tired of the junk on Facebook. And you just, the closer you draw to God, you'll see who the real, your real friends are, the real followers of Christ.

Resting in God's Sovereignty

Because there's a difference there, there's a distinction. Surviving the anointing by resting in God's sovereignty. This is huge. When you're filled with the Spirit of God, to keep that anointing. If you want, now I'm talking, I know not everybody, but those who wanna be filled with God's power, his presence, and after you're there walking with him, you have to be very careful of this.

You have to rely on his sovereignty. God says, Samuel, I have provided myself a king. So Samuel says, the oil's not flowing, the oil's not flowing, there must be another one, there must be another one, there must be another one, nothing's working here.

God says, no, no, no, no, no, you guys got it wrong, you're judging by appearance. So you have to trust his sovereignty, because many times we go through life by it, what's happening? What's happening to us?

Actually, did you know that's where the word happy comes from? Happenstance. What's happening to me, I'm happy. And a Christian's supposed to have joy, not happiness. Because if you try to have happiness, oh, get ready.

You're like, why am I always miserable? Because you're measuring your happiness by what's happening to you. And God is sovereign, God's in control. We can get up in the morning and say, Lord, you're in control, you are sovereign.

And once we begin to doubt his sovereignty, then we start to make decisions based on how things look. God's not quick enough, he's not moving fast enough, and I need to do this, and I need to do that.