How To Function With Unction

How To Function With Unction! 1 John 2:18-28

Last week during the message, I was preaching about how King Jehoshaphat knew that the ministers of King Ahab were fake and phony and I said that we should be able to spot a fake. I received some funny looks. I am well aware of the fact that sometimes we are fooled by people and our discernment is either not working properly or is not well honed enough by the Spirit or we simply do not trust our discernment.

I am also well aware of what Jesus said: John 6:69 And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. 70 Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? 71 He spake of Judas Iscariot the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve.

Now with all of this in mind, how in the world can people, saved people, detect a phony? Let’s look at our text again: 19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. 20 But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things. 21 I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth.

In verse 20, we are told that we have an unction from the Holy One and we know all things. So what is this very special, very significant and very vital yet very often neglected anointing from the Holy Spirit of God?

Luke 4:14 And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee: and there went out a fame of him through all the region round about. 15 And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified of all. 16 And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read. 17 And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,

18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, 19 To preach the acceptable year of the Lord. 20 And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him.

When the Lord Jesus came back to Galilee, He came back filled with the Holy Spirit, KJV says returned in the power of the Spirit but the Greek actually says He came back full of and under the influence of the Holy Spirit. In verse 18 it says that the Spirit of the Lord was upon Jesus and anointed Jesus. It was this anointing, this filling that enabled the Lord Jesus to perform miracles, to heal, to deliver, to set free captives and to declare the Word of God!

Now 1 John 2 tells us that we have an unction from the Holy One. If it was vitally important for the Lord Jesus to be filled with the Holy Spirit, how much more so is that true for all of us that are saved? In John 14, the Lord told the disciples that it was necessary for Him to go away in order for the Holy Spirit to come. Now John has already told us that through this anointing, this unction, we can know the things of God!

1 Cor. 2:14 says But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. This unction and anointing are absolutely vital to understanding the Word of God. No person can take the Word of God and comprehend it unless that person has the Spirit of God and that is what Paul was saying in 1 Cor. 2:14.

I have heard people say well I would like to know more about the Word of God and be better able to understand what God’s will for my life is. Most Christians don’t realize that there is so much more to the Christian life than church attendance and do’s and don’ts. That is why so many Christians end up frustrated or even going back to their old way of life because they have not experienced this unction from the Holy One.