Unction From On High

THERE IS A POWER THAT IS placed at the disposal of the Church that can
outmaneuver and baffle the very strategy of Hell, and cause death and defeat to
vanish before the presence of the Lord of Life. Barrenness is made to feel His
fertilizing power. Yet, how is it that while we make such great claims for the
power of the Gospel, we see so little of the supernatural in operation? Is
there any reason why the Church today cannot everywhere equal the Church at
Pentecost? I feel this is a question we ought to face with an open mind and an
honest heart. What did the early Church have that we do not possess today?
Nothing but the Holy Spirit, nothing but the power of God. Here I would suggest
that one of the main secrets of success in the early Church lay in the fact
that the early believers believed in unction from on high and not entertainment
from men.

One of the very sad features that characterizes much that goes under the name
of evangelism today is the craze for entertainment. Here is an extract from a
letter received from a leader in youth work in one of your great cities:
“We are at our wits’ end to know what to do with the young people who made
a profession of conversion recently. They are demanding all sorts of entertainment,
and it seems to us that if we fail to provide the entertainment that they want,
we are not going to hold them.” Yes, the trend of the time in which we
live is toward a Christian experience that is light and flippant and fed on
entertainment. Some time ago, I listened to a young man give his testimony. He
made a decision quite recently, and in giving his testimony this is what he
said: “I have discovered that the Christian way of life can best be
described, not as a battle, but as a song mingled with the sound of happy
laughter.” Far be it from me to move the song or happy laughter from
religion, but I want to protest that that young man’s conception was entirely
wrong, and not in keeping with true New Testament Christianity. “Oh, but,”
say the advocates of this way of thinking, “how are we to get the people
if we do not provide some sort of entertainment?” To that I ask the
question, how did they get the people at Pentecost? How did the early Church
get the people? By publicity projects, by bills, by posters, by parades, by
pictures? No! The people were arrested and drawn together and brought into
vital relationship with God, not by sounds from men, but by sounds from heaven.
We are in need of more sounds from heaven today.

Pentecost was its own publicity. I love that passage in Acts that tells us that
“when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together.” What was
noised abroad? That men and women were coming under deep conviction. That was
God’s method of publicity, and until the Church of Jesus Christ rediscovers
this and acts upon it, we shall at our best appear to a mad world as a crowd of
common people in a common market babbling about common wares. The early Church
cried for unction and not for entertainment. Unction is the dire and desperate
need of the ministry today.

Power Before Influence

Further, the early Church put power before influence. The present state of our
country presents a challenge to the Christian Church. Those who have eyes to
see tell us that at this very hour forces are taking the field that are out to
defy every known Christian principle. In many quarters there is today a growing
conviction that unless God moves, unless there is a demonstration of the
supernatural in the midst of men, unless we are moved up into the realm of the
Divine, we shall soon find ourselves caught up in a counterfeit movement, but a
movement that goes under the name of evangelism. There are ominous sighs today
that the devil is out to sidetrack us in the sphere of evangelism, and we are going
to become satisfied with something less than Heaven wills to give us. Nothing
but a Holy Spirit revival will meet the desperate need of the hour.

The Watchword of the Early Church

The early Church, the men of Pentecost, had something beyond mere human
influence and human ingenuity. But what do we mean by influence? The sum total
of all the forces in our personality–mental, moral, academic, social, and
religious. We can have all these, and we can have them at their highest level,
and yet be destitute of power. Power, not influence, was the watchword of the
early Church.

While at the Keswick Convention, it was my privilege to spend an afternoon with
a leader in foreign mission activity. I was arrested by what that man said to
me. Here are his words: “Our Bible schools are turning out young men and
young women who are cultured and polished, but who lack power.” I want to
suggest that he was near to the truth. We may be polished, we may have culture,
but the cry of our day is for power from on high.

A Young Woman

I could take you to a little cottage in the Hebrides and introduce you to a
young woman. She is not educated. One could not say that she was polished in
the sense that we use the word, but I have known that young woman to pray
heaven into a community, to pray power into a meeting. I have known that young
woman to be so caught in the power of the Holy Spirit that men and women around
her were made to tremble–not influence, but power.

The Apostles were not men of influence–“not many mighty, not many
noble.” The Master Himself did not choose to be a man of influence.
“He made Himself of no reputation,” which is to say that God chose
power rather than influence. I sometimes think of Paul and Silas in Philippi.
They had not enough influence to keep them out of prison, but possessed the
power of God in such a manner that their prayers in prison shook the whole
prison to its very foundations. Not influence, but power.

The Place of Power

Oh, that the Church today, in our congregations and in our pulpits, would
rediscover this truth and get back to the place of God realization, to the
place of power. I want to say further that we should seek power even at the
expense of influence. What do I mean by that? I mean this: never compromise to
accommodate the devil. I hear people say today, “These are different days
from the days of the 1859 Revival or the Welsh Revival. We must be tolerant and
we must try to accommodate.” The secret of power is separation from all
that is unclean. We must seek power even at the expense of influence.

Separation Unto God

Think again of the great Apostle Paul. What an opportunity he had of gaining
influence with Felix. Had he but flattered him a little in his sin, he could
have made a great impression, and I believe he could have got a handsome
donation for his missionary effort by being tolerant, by accommodating the
situation. But Paul chose power before influence and he reasoned of sin, of
righteousness, and of judgment. Let Felix say what he will, let Drusilla think
as she chooses to think, I must be true to my conscience and to my inner
convictions and declare the whole counsel of God and take my stand on the solid
ground of separation unto God. Now the person who will take his stand on that
ground will not be popular.

He will not be popular with some preachers of today who declare that we must
soft-pedal in order to capture and captivate. Here I would quote from the
saintly Finney: “Away with your milk and water preaching of the love of
Christ that has no holiness or moral discrimination in it, away with preaching
a Christ not crucified for sin.” Such a collapse of moral conscience in
this land could never have happened if the Puritan element in our preaching had
not, in great measure, fallen out.

Hear a Highland minister preaching on this very truth: “Bring me a God all
mercy but not just, bring me a God all love but not righteous, and I will have
no scruples in calling Him an idiot of your imagination.” Strong words,
but I say words that I would sound throughout our land today, in this age of
desperate apostasy, forsaking all the fundamental truths of Scripture. Here you
have the Apostles proclaiming a message that was profoundly disturbing. We are
afraid of disturbing people today. May God help us; may God have mercy upon us.

A Wave Of Real Godly Fear

I would to God that a wave of real godly fear gripped our land. Let me quote
from a sermon delivered by the Rev. Robert Barr of the Presbyterian Church of
South Africa: “This is what our age needs, not an easy-moving message, the
sort of thing that makes the hearer feel all nice inside, but a message
profoundly disturbing. We have been far too afraid of disturbing people, but
the Holy Spirit will have nothing to do with a message or with a minister who
is afraid of disturbing. You might as well expect a surgeon to give place to a
quack who claims to be able to do the job with some sweet tasting drug, as
expect the Holy Spirit to agree that the tragic plight of human souls today can
be met by soft and easy words. Calvary was anything but nice to look at,
blood-soaked beams of wood, a bruised and bleeding body, not nice to look upon.
But then Jesus was not dealing with a nice thing; He was dealing with the sin
of the world, and that is what we are called upon to deal with today. Soft and
easy words, soft-pedaling will never meet the need.”

Finally, the early Church believed in the supernatural. Someone has said that
at Pentecost, God set the Church at Jerusalem on fire and the whole city came
out to see it burn. I tell you if that happened in any church today, within
hours the whole of the town would be out to see the burning, and they would be
caught in the flames.

A Fire Needed!

It is fire we want. The best advertising campaign that any church or any
mission can put up is fire in the pulpit and a blaze in the pew. Let us be
honest. We say “God, send revival,” but are we prepared for the fire?
I believe we have only to regard and observe those laws and limits within which
the Holy Spirit acts, and we shall find His glorious power at our disposal.
Surely that was the conviction that gripped an elder in the Isle of Lewis when,
in a situation that was difficult and trying, he cried, “You made a
promise, and I want to remind You that we believe You are a covenant-keeping
God. Your honor is at stake.” That man was at the end of his tether; that
man was in the place of travail.

Absolute Surrender

Revival is not going to come merely by attending conferences. When “Zion
travailed she brought forth children.” Oh, may God bring us there, may God
lead us through to the place of absolute surrender. Is it not true that our
very best moments of yielding and consecration are mingled with the destructive
element of self-preservation? A full and complete surrender is the price of
blessing; it is the price of revival.??

Duncan Campbell (1898-1672) – A fiery Scottish preacher used of God in revival.
He is most famous for being involved in the Lewis Awakening in the Hebrides
Islands in Scotland.

It is not uncommon these days to hear Christian leaders say to the people, “If you think about it, then you’re not living by faith”. This statement is not only unbiblical, but extremely dangerous. This sort of belief opens the door for believers to be entertained by doctrines of demons, lying signs and wonders. Nowhere in scripture are we forbidden to “use our brain”. There is a fine line between thinking biblically and being critical. While being critical is prohibited by the Lord (Matthew 7:1-2), trying or testing is commanded (1 John 4:1). How can we examine or test a spirit, if thinking is off limits? Consider two contrasting examples from the Bible. In the first example, we will see that the people had turned off their minds and stop thinking for themselves. The second example, however, reveals a very different group of people who did not just accept what they heard, and as a result, were commended for it.

In the book of Galatians, the Apostle Paul delivers a strong rebuke to individuals who were turning away from the only true gospel. He was shocked to hear this beloved church was moving toward a different gospel – one that would eventually lead the people to eternal damnation (Galatians 1:6-9). The reason this church had moved away was because they were not thinking biblically. This is confirmed in chapter 3 when Paul states, “O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you…”.

Note that the word foolish, as it is used in this context, does not mean one who lacks wits or intelligence. It is, rather, a Greek usage of the word which means one who is not thinking something through or one who is not “using his head”. Paul, by the Holy Spirit, states that reason the Galatians were being deceived is because they were not using their heads concerning the false teaching. Instead, they were bewitched (being led by their emotions).

Let’s look at our last example. In the Book of Acts, Paul preaches to a group of people called the Bereans (Acts 17:10-12). The Bible says that when they heard Paul preach, they immediately went back and searched the scriptures to see if what they were hearing was true. Notice that neither Paul, nor the Holy Spirit, rebuked or condemned these followers. They, unlike the Galatians, were commended and called “fair minded”.

Has the act of being a Berean become sinful? Is this type of mindset now forbidden?

There are some valuable lessons that we can learn from the Bereans. They are lessons that could protect us from deception today.

1) They elevated scriptures above the Apostle Paul’s popularity.
2) They used the Word of God, and not miracles and crowds, as the sole tool for determining if something is of God.
3) They had a readiness for the Word and did not seek out signs for confirmation.
4) They were ready to reject Paul’s counsel, regardless of his reputation, if what he taught contradicted the Word.
5) They had disciplines that prepare them to go back, reread and examine everything they were taught before accepting it as truth.

Paul didn’t reprimand them for searching or thinking, so why is it different today? Why do we believe that thinking is not a sign of faith? The enemy of our soul has a plan. And his plan is to remove the concept of thinking biblically. He wants us to accept the, sometimes, tainted Word of Leaders as that of God’s. It is our responsibility to test the spirit just as the Bereans did. Those who do not are as foolish as the Galatians that Paul rebuked.

It’s time to take inventory of our lives to see if we are Galatians or Bereans. Only one group will see the Lord!!

 1) God will give the nation leaders, who, outwardly, will meet the qualifications of the people desires, but inwardly, they are disqualified with God.

2) People’s experiences and opinions will rule and govern in the place of God’s Word.

3) The people’s ability to discern between right and wrong will be limited.

4) Biblical discernment will be cast down and labeled unloving and critical.

5) False prophets will be “crowned” and “ordained” to be the spokesperson for the Lord.

6) Unbiblical and unholy behavior will be paraded as normal and acceptable practices.

7) True biblical love will be replaced with worldly tolerance.

8) Unity will be built on man’s feelings and not the scriptures.

9) Wholesome teaching will be considered out dated (old fashioned) and boring.

10) The Truth will be mocked while error is being applauded.

11) People will believe things that the Word never taught.

12) A True Word from God will be hard to find.

13) Godly leadership will become the minority /unpopular.

14) Unbalanced scales will be the negotiating tool of the day.

15) A vacuum of God’s presence will be exchanged for hype and emotionalism.

16) Man will hate and abandoned the truth but then adorn and join a lie.

17) Holiness will be classified as “traditional” while worldliness become relevant.

18) Sexual perversion will no longer be considered abnormal but common.

19) A love of self will be esteemed and valued as the cure to life issues.

20) Pride will be promoted as being honorable while humility is viewed as shameful.

21) God’s warnings and wake up calls will be attributed to the workings of Satan.

22) The people will turn a deaf ear to anything that sounds “negative”.

23) Ministers of Satan will be “exalted” and given a large platform while God’s prophets are shunned from the microphones.

24) Those who refused to used their voice will lose their voices.

25) The people will become “fans” of men and not followers of Christ.