The Spirit of the LORD

 

There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, And a Branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him,  The Spirit of wisdom and understanding, The Spirit of counsel and might,  The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD. His delight is in the fear of the LORD,  And He shall not judge by the sight of His eyes,  Nor decide by the hearing of His ears;  But with righteousness He shall judge the poor,  And decide with equity for the meek of the earth;  He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth,  And with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked.  Righteousness shall be the belt of His loins, And faithfulness the belt of His waist. Isaiah 11:1-5

Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.  But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.  But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For "who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?" But we have the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2:12-16

The Word of God tells us in Isaiah 11:1-5 that Jesus was totally dependent on the Holy Spirit to lead, guide, direct, help and anoint Him, as well as to do the miracles. The power of the Lord was present to heal all (Luke 4:18, 5:17). Everyone who came to Jesus was healed by Him! He had a perfect track record in the area of healing. He unlike others never made an excuse why some were not healed. He didn’t collect the names of people who were healed to show them off or to build a mass mailing list, or see and use them as usable commodities as some Christian ministries do? Jesus’ anointing was unlimited or without measure for the purposes of healing and delivering all that came to Him. And we can all have the same anointing for all that belong to Jesus belongs to the Father, and what belong to the Father belongs to Jesus and what belongs to Jesus belongs to us (John 16; 14-15)? And this includes Paul, Apollos and others. God’s word is unchanging:

Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase.

Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor.  For we are God's fellow workers; you are God's field, you are God's building.  According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it.  For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.  Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw,  each one's work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one's work, of what sort it is.  If anyone's work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward.  If anyone's work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.(1 Corinthians 3:5-15)

It’s to be noted that ministry is not to facilitate the vision of the house and its evangelist or pastor.  Ministry is not to get rich off the sheep.  Ministry is not to pursue a secret hidden agenda for prominence, fortune and fame like Judas who betrayed Jesus for his greed (Matthew 26:24, Luke 6; 16, Luke 22:3). Yes Judas healed the sick, cast out devils and fellowshipped with Jesus and also stole money from the treasurer and was a betrayer and traitor! Unlike others even of our day, Jesus did not just teach or preach but He did real works such as cast out devils, heal the sick, raise the dead, cause cripples to walk, and rebuked religious Pharisees who didn’t do such things! What Jesus lacked in any area of His life He made up for it by the power of the anointing. Prayer, knowledge of the Word of God and the anointing were the only things Jesus needed to minister to the poor, hurting and needy people. And He did a very successful job! Mind you the bible doesn’t tell us that in Jesus’ meetings were seen the  weird manifestations in so called revivals  today, including laughter, weeping, falling, shaking, jerking and roaring!  A.L. Gill  in his article "A Call for the Discerning of Spirits in This End-Time Revival” states:

However, just because these manifestations occurred in past revivals does not necessarily mean that they were, or are from God. Often when the anointing of God becomes the strongest, demons begin to manifest. Isaiah wrote, “The anointing breaks the yoke ...”

In India, where people worship serpents, I have witnessed demons manifesting like serpents. In the name of Jesus, I have commanded the manifestations to stop, and the person has lain there as if unconscious until the end of the preaching. Then I could minister deliverance without distracting from the preaching or from the ministry that followed.

In other parts of Asia where people eat live monkey brains, I have seen demons manifesting like monkeys in the overwhelming presence of God.

In our meetings, when we can have teams trained ahead of time, if a demon starts to manifest and distract during the teaching, I have moved the people's attention to the opposite side of the assembly. Then the workers could quickly move the person to a separate location to minister deliverance. This keeps demons from distracting the people away from what the Spirit of God is doing.

I understand that it's now a common practice in large meetings in Argentina and other South American nations where great revival is being experienced, for trained ushers to remove people who are having demonic manifestations from the main tent. They are taken into another tent where trained teams minister deliverance.

There are times when I have witnessed overt manifestations that I knew by the discerning of spirits were not from God. However, I knew also they were not demonic. They were simply an uncontrolled emotional response from that person’s soul or flesh.

…Part of the problem is that many are following the manifestations instead of discerning the moves of God. To discern if a move is truly of the Spirit, we must know it through the Spirit – not through our mental reasoning powers. We can know what is of the Holy Spirit, or from the human flesh, or from an evil spirit, by the operation of the revelation gifts of the Holy Spirit. The gift of the discerning of spirits is probably the most needed but neglected of the nine supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus warned that in these last days “even the elect would be deceived if that were possible.” Why is it not possible? – because of the gift of discerning of spirits.

We need to understand once more what the discerning of spirits is. Often we hear it called the gift of discernment. It’s not that. The New International Bible refers to this gift as distinguishing between spirits, and this is a more accurate definition.

Discernment is an operation of human wisdom in the area of the mind. It comes through the reasoning power of the mind. An unbeliever or a carnal Christian can operate in discernment.

The gift of the discerning of, or distinguishing between spirits, is a supernatural gift of the Holy Spirit by which we receive supernatural revelation from the Holy Spirit directly into our spirits. It is a “knowing” that comes into our spirits by which we discern the nature of any spirit being manifested.

By its operation, we can discern the presence, nature and function of God, His angels, evil spirits or a human spirit. We can supernaturally know what is of God, what is of the flesh, or of the satanic kingdom. We will not be judging the action but knowing the spirit causing the action.

In this present renewal or revival, leaders must know each manifestation by the Spirit. Then they must operate in the gift of the discerning of spirits. They must operate in the gift of supernatural wisdom to know what to do when the manifestation is from the flesh or demonic in origin.