The Secret of Power in Oyedepo's Understanding the Anointing

By Isaac Attah Ogezi Since the Fall of Man in the Garden of Eden until now, there has been a palpable tension or fight between the forces of good and evil, light and darkness, God and Satan. These two diametrically opposed forces or powers operate in the realm of the supernatural where the lesser bows to the greater in obedience to the scriptural injunction, 'Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers ...' (Romans 13:1). For one not to be a victim in a world groaning under the magnetic field of wickedness, one must align with the higher power and ensure that he is imbued with power from on high against the onslaught of the enemy, the accuser of the brethren. That is why David Oyedepo's Understanding the Anointing, though first published in 1998, cannot fail but be timely and ever relevant today. It lays bare in an easy-to-comprehend manner the subject of the anointing without an assumption of previous knowledge on the part of the reader. The opening chapter begins with the definition of what the anointing is all about. 'It is the empowering of the Spirit of God for supernatural accomplishments. It is the Holy Spirit at work in a man, producing extraordinary results. The anointing is God's devise for equipping men to do exploits' (page 10). For until the anointing came upon Jesus by the descension of the Holy Ghost on Him, He was for the first thirty years of His life without an identity, a mere carpenter's son. Thereafter He returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee and His fame was noised abroad, all the regions round about. However, an understanding of the anointing is impossible without first knowing the person of the Holy Spirit, for a discovery of His personality makes it easy for one 'to know how He empowers people for supernatural feats' (page 11). As the Third Person in the Godhead, the trinity, the Holy Spirit is the Chief Executive of the divine programme on earth and is in charge of the affairs on earth, behind every exploit in the Kingdom of God. Until the Holy Spirit moved at every command by God the Father upon the face of the waters at Creation, the earth was without form and void and darkness prevailed. In like manner, until He came upon the disciples of Christ on the day of Pentecost in the form of cloven tongues of fire and birthed the Church of Christ on earth, the erstwhile timid men became bold and fearless. He is the promised Comforter, Helper, fulfiller of vision, teacher of things to come and seven-dimensional in operation: the Spirit of the Lord, wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge and the fear of the Lord (Isaiah 11:1-3). Who then is the source of the anointing? In Chapter Two, the reader gets to know that God the Father is the Anointer while Jesus the Son is the Baptizer. And when the anointing comes upon a man, it is a form of initiation into the world of power in life and ministry, it empowers him with the unction to function and to operate in the supernatural. When this happens, he is turned into another man, he is given an identity, put in command, endued with the ability for the recovery of anything lost, propelled for progress, clothed with an aura of favour, become a sign, surrounded by a wall of divine protection and empowered with Elijah-like anointing that will make him go beyond his natural strength. However, like all good things of life, the anointing is not without a price. Just as there is a difference between the anointing 'upon' of the Old Testament and the anointing 'within' at Pentecost (page 43), the baptism of the Holy Spirit does not qualify as the anointing alone. 'It is like an introduction to life in the spirit. But the anointing brings you to the power realm of life. In other words, while the baptism is a form of initiation, the anointing is the enabling' (page 56). The anointing must cost the believer the price of a genuine thirst (crave) for it by first having an encounter with God in person in order to receive it, as reiterated by Jesus: 'If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink' (John 7:37). This is the foundation for the anointing before any other sources of encounter in the course of studying anointed books as well as by impartation via the laying-on of hands as in the case of Joshua by Moses. Chapter Four dwells further on how to receive the anointing. A combination of factors must be in place for the empowerment or enablement by the Spirit, to wit: consecration (purity) after conviction and repentance, thirst (heart-seated longing or desire) which can be generated by seeing one's helplessness without it and one's need to be empowered, fasting and supplication and the study of the Word. The anointing is in measures. The degree to which an individual is anointed is 'not God-determined but man-determined' (page 96). At new birth, the journey of the anointing is said to have begun at the seashore level which could further be grown to the ankle-level (baptism of the Holy Ghost), and then to the knee-level of great power, before the loin-level of exceeding great power and finally to the immeasurable level in the class of Christ where you get 'strange insights into the deep of the deep of God that bring you to the realm of powers' of the world to come where you practically experience heaven on earth (pages 113 and 114). The all-important question then is how can one grow from one level of the anointing to another? Chapter Six examines the factor for growth, the vital forces that will ensure increase in the anointing. The key factor is the Word of God, the wood for the fire of the Spirit. For until the Word is embraced, 'there will be no increase in unction' (page 121) nor will the fire that will keep the wild beasts of life at bay be sustained. The level of unction one operates is a function of one's depth in the Word, whether it is at the milk (babyhood or ankle level) or meat (knee level) or strong meat (loin level), or honey level (river level where you swim in the anointing). The Word is a vital source of power and no one 'can grow in the anointing without growing in the Word' (page 127). It is not enough to be anointed, one must know how to operate under it. The key to this is what the writer called the law of divine signals in Chapter Seven, which is the art of being spiritually sensitive. For until 'you know how to be led in the Spirit and are wise enough to move when He leads, you can never manifest your sonship' (page 136). The mystery of divine signals is being sensitive to know the things that are commanded per time and doing them, then shall one experience overflowing unction and the quickening of the mind. Sensitivity to divine signals is tied to righteousness and faithfulness of the believer. In Chapter Eight, the reader is forewarned that once anointed is not forever anointed. Put differently, the anointed believer must consciously do certain things as a lifestyle to sustain the anointing in his life. It takes the combination of vital forces such as wisdom, consecration (purity), fellowship with the brethren, dedication or total commitment to God and the affairs of His Kingdom, the Word and meditation on it as well as prayers without season coupled with periodic fasting for the anointing to be preserved. From the foregoing, there is no doubt that for a believer who is cutting his teeth in the things of the Spirit and is desirous to grow in power, this book is an indispensable companion as it will carry him through an in-depth understanding of what the anointing entails, how to be anointed, the person of the Holy Spirit vis-à-vis the anointing, His operations and what it takes to experience His infilling. There is no gainsaying the fact that if the precepts in this book are followed to the letter, the believer will experience an end to all struggles in life and be ushered into a world of sweatless, stress-free triumphs, uncommon favour, signs and wonders, staggering results in life and ministry, endless victory and breakthroughs, which the anointing enforces as there is no substitute for it.