Leon Fontaine - Anointed
Hey, everybody! Welcome! It's good to have you with me today as we dive into God's Word. I love to teach the Word in a way that helps people practically change. And one of the things we want to talk about today is you. What's your gift? You could say, "Well, let's look at what my focus should be? What is my calling? What do I do with my life"? So many people struggle with that, and then they're looking for their giftedness to determine their future. They're looking for their identity outside of the call of God, the love of God, and it just creates all sorts of havoc. It creates people comparing themselves to each other. It makes us at certain times in our life go through real unhappiness as we go, "What have I achieved with my life"?
As though some kind of achievement is what makes us great. But you what, a thousand years ago there were Christians on the planet, and you don't remember anything they achieved or what they've done. And even if the people who were raised up, you know, had that kind of real impact. So we've got to stop comparing ourselves to others and we've got to find a real fulfillment and a real purpose in God, so that our lives are rich and beautiful. And let's remember this, that it's not about what you do in your life. It's about your life with Jesus. It's about your relationship with Him.
And so many people are always looking at what they have achieved on the outside. And there's the thing, when you really have a great relationship with God, when you understand Holy Spirit's role in your life. Of course, you're gonna achieve great things for the kingdom of God. But when you get focused on your external world before you get focused on your internal world. You're always going to be messed up. So today, we're gonna talk a little bit about, we're gonna use well-known scriptures to go in places I don't know if you've thought through.
Acts 1:8, says this, "But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth". All right. Let's just pair this right down and recognize it. Every follower of Christ has power, ability. This power is power to have moral power. It's power to handle money, power to handle people, power to be whatever you need to be. It's power to create miracles. When you look up the word power here and you see how this presence of God that is within you. He literally do anything because Holy Spirit is within you. And then it says, and you are going to be My witnesses.
So if we stop right there, regardless whether you're an actor, a lawyer, a television producer, whatever you're doing right now. Maybe you're a mom, a grandmother, a grandfather. That regardless of the giftedness, where you are in corporate structure, where you are in your family, the second oldest, the grandpa, the grandma. All of us are to be witnesses to those around us. And this word witnesses is a unique word. And I'm not gonna dive into just this but it literally means that you have witnessed something.
If you were in a court of law or if I went to court and I find out that it's about a car accident. So they call me to the stand. They swear me in. And the judge says, "Leon, did you witness the accidents that these whole legal proceedings are about"? And I go, "No, your honor. I wasn't even there". Oh, what are you doing in my court? You're not a witness to any of this? No. Well, then get out. Like, a witness is somebody who has experienced in the five senses literally what is going on in their world. And so, we need to be witnesses. And it says, and you shall be witnesses to Me. So we need to begin to know God, experience God, and not just with our five senses but, I mean, with literally our relationships. We need to know His Word.
So that when people talk to us, we can say, "Oh, I am a witness to the peace of God. I'm a witness to the power of God. I'm a witness to the love of God". You need to experience God. If you don't experience God, all you've got... I was talking to somebody then he said. "Well, what's your testimony? Would you like to share and encourage the people in our church? Because, you know, I've never, I don't really have any great things that happened to my life because of God". Now, he was talking about I've got saved, you know, from a charging bull in a pasture, you know, miraculously or I was healed from cancer or I beat an addiction to drugs. He had no external miracle.
And I said to him, "Listen, you are a witness. What did God do in your life"? And he started talking about his peace and the joy that he had now. And I said, "This is what people need to be aware of. That we are a witness of these things". So the word anointed is often thrown around by believers. And if they hear a singer, and when he sings that make sure a hair stand and put tears in your eyes. They all say something like, "My, he was anointed". And a, maybe he was, okay. But sometimes we see the anointing as a power flow. But actually, the anointing means something a little bit different and it's connected to all that. But let me read you a verse that talks about the anointing. It said, "How God anointed and consecrated Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with strength and ability and power. He went about doing good in particular, curing all who were harassed, oppressed by the power of the devil, for God was with Him".
Notice the word anointing. Then in Luke 4:18, it says, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor, anointed Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised". All right. These two terms, there's not many verses in the New Testament at all that used the word the anointing. Now, when they are, they're talking about Jesus the anointed One.
Now, in the Old Testament that, you know, there's a specific anointing on a king, a unique and specific anointing on a priest, then on a prophet. And there were some other people that had unique anointings on them to do certain things for God, and that might be a business person, an artist, etcetera. But in the New Testament since the cross, we don't have separate anointings. Now, we might have a giftedness. We might have a different function, you know, that is in our world, but all of us have the anointed One, Jesus in us. So when you look at somebody who can lay hands on the sick and they recover. That's not his anointing.
All of us are anointed to do this because this Jesus is in us. And it's one of the hardest things to get the regular believer. We could call them the normal Christian to really see how powerful they are because they begin to go back in the Old Testament doctrine and look at, that man's a healing evangelist. That person is a prophet of God. Now, if they're called to be an evangelist, which is what Jesus does, the five-fold ministry is a calling to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. So that could be a pastor. That could be an evangelist. But they are to equip the saints to do all these things that all these stars do on stage whether it's healing conferences, prophetic conferences.
Whether it's, all these things. We are to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry with the presence of God flowing through them to heal, to give people words of knowledge, to give people words of wisdom, to prophesy into people's lives in a very cool and contemporary way at work. You know, one of the things I'm always passionate about is having a Spirit Contemporary life. Spiritually alive, filled with the presence of God. And then functioning in a way that the world is attracted to us.
You say, "Leon, the world won't be, no"? The Bible doesn't say that everybody is gonna be upset by us. Some will be. But there's, people were attracted to Jesus by the thousands and thousands they packed out. This attractiveness needs to be on us. That we have a wisdom to talk to people, a love that flows off of us that it touches them in a deep way. When we're in situations, you know, the miraculous power of God's flowing through us as well. So you are anointed because of the anointed One, Jesus, who is in your spirit. You have everything that you need. 2 Peter chapter 1 talks about you've been given all things that pertain to life and godliness. If you need peace. If you need joy. If you have to raise kids, make your marriage work.
Whatever promises, whatever thing you need for a life, God's already placed it within you. You don't need to go chasing down somebody whom you think has a special anointing. And we have to be careful with that word special anointing because people can have functions from God. And we're all a part of the body, one is the hand, one is the eye, and so we function differently. But this same Jesus is in you. I often tell people, we've created two words the Bible never uses. And that is the ministry and the clergy and the ministry and then the laity. That's not even in the Bible.
The laity to most people is, "Well, I'm not called. I'm the laity. I'm kind of the little servant person that will serve water or park cars and that's not that important". No, that's totally wrong because there are no rookies or lower people when it come to the power and the presence of God. All right? Now, God might call you to be a hand in the body of Christ. He might call you to head up kid's ministry. But the same presence of God, the same anointing that is upon all the leaders is the same Jesus that are on the people that they serve. And in fact, let's look at the five-fold ministry and those who are "in the professional ministry". That they're not even to be doing the work of the ministry. They're to be equipping the saints to do the work of the ministry.
I love comparing that to a coach who's on the sidelines and he's a great coach. But on a football team, he's the worst kicker, the worst quarterback, the worst blocker, the worst runner. He could be horribly out of shape and have no football skills whatsoever, but he has a coaching skill. And so he manages to work with the team but it's the time that goes out. And this is the way we need to see. Pastors and leaders, I mean, evangelist and teachers and apostles and prophets. We're not to be the ones out entertaining people.
Can you imagine if you like to see your favorite football team in your city and they were playing one of the best teams who came in, flew in and on the field is the coaches. You've got the head coach, the defense coach, the offense coach. You've got coaches looking at and they're on the team playing the coaches from the other team. And all these talented players are sitting on the sidelines while this out of shape not even gifted to play coaches go at each other. It's the most boring display of ability you could ever see. Why? Because if churches can ever give this, get this, that you as the pastor or whatever gifting is on you to lead that church. Maybe you have a prophetic ministry. Maybe a prophet. Maybe evangelist or teacher or apostolic. Whatever you want to call it and whatever unique thing you are in the church of Jesus Christ. We are called to equip the saints for the work of the ministry.
Raise up if you want to use the football analogy. Raise up greater kickers. Raise up greater quarterbacks. Get them to working together as a team to accomplish what the church of Jesus Christ needs to accomplish. But instead in most cases we have this five-fold ministries running around displaying their ability to operate in the gifts of Spirit. Now, there's nothing wrong with that if its purpose is to, you know, be a witness to the things of God and to raise up the body of Christ. So that others all begin to do what they do as an example of coaching and equipping and causing the body of Christ to rise up in that area. So I am not saying that you can make yourself a pastor, make yourself an evangelist or a prophet or an apostle, a teacher. Those are called by God to a position in the body of Christ.
Now, but as people of God anointed with Jesus on the inside of you. You can teach others the Word of God. Your neighbor down the street or Sunday school class, etcetera. You can literally give words to people who are going through something and God shows you something about it. And you're sitting with your neighbor and say, "Bro, this is what I sense about you". He goes, "That's totally true. How did you know that"? God is working through us. We all should function in the gifts of the Spirit, led by Holy Spirit making decisions whether its investments or who to hire. Laying hands on friends and praying with neighbors who are going through cancer. All of these things should be in the body of Christ, so that there're phenomenal incredible teams. Every believer is filled with the Spirit of the Lord and so the anointed One.
The word anointing means to smear oil on somebody or to pour oil on them which consecrates them for a specific set apart calling. When David as a shepherd boy was brought before Samuel, and Samuel poured this oil over him. He was anointed. It just means that this oil at that moment he was set apart consecrated for a unique and special calling. And that the abilities to fulfill that calling now have been handed to him, and this is before the cross. So David, and pick other men Saul. Now, you can still go against what your call is like Saul and in his case, in the Old Testament, get disqualified from that ministry. But in the New Testament, the anointed One, Jesus is in us. We don't see people being pulled out in the New Testament, an oil poured on them to set them apart to a unique anointing nobody else has.
So you've got to be careful using the word anointing. Okay? Because everybody has Jesus, the anointed One on the inside of them. And Jesus is anointed for anything that needs to flow. The gifts of the Spirit. The direction of the Holy Spirit. I mean, whether it is the gifts of the Spirit that reveals something like the word of knowledge, the word of wisdom, the gift of prophecy. Whether it's the power gifts like the gifts of healings. You know, like the gift of faith, like the working of miracles. All of these gifts are in Holy Spirit. He's in us. And so it's not like you don't have a gift. Never say that when it comes to the gifts of Spirit, the nine gifts. Don't say I don't have that. Oh, no. You just haven't learned to flow in that. You might be around somebody else who works in the word of knowledge. You might be around someone else who has a gift of healing. And so your faith grew in it. You started trying it out and you begin to function that way. But all nine are in Holy Spirit who is in you. So this is crucial for us to know.
Now, in Romans 8:11, it's a verse that gives us a great indication of this internal world. And it says, "But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwells in you". So to minister to others out there, Holy Spirit has to guide you. You have to get them to believe to a certain area because Jesus couldn't do miracles in His own town and He marveled of their unbelief. But here, how do you as a believer walk in the healing power of God, the peace of God, the presence of God. It says that He that raised Christ from the dead, which is Holy Spirit. He is in you and He quickens your mortal body.
Healing doesn't come from heaven, peace, joy doesn't come from heaven. It comes from within you. And I'm on a mission to help people be Spirit Contemporary. That they'll be alive with the Spirit of God and learn to flow in the things of the Spirit in the typical world, not just in a church. In a church service, in a healing service, in a prophetic conference. But all of us should be functioning in this in everyday life, knowing things, making decisions, ministering to people in a cool contemporary way. That doesn't cause God to be looked down upon. But you're being led by Him. And these things are crucial. So, if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you. Then He that raised up Jesus from the dead, shall also quicken your body.
So, what all did the Holy Spirit do for Jesus? It made this body work, every organ, every cell, every bone, every joint. It had been decayed. This body was corrupted. This body had been rotting. The cells were all burst, fallen apart. Doctors will know how these bodies, I mean, it's just. But the Spirit of God healed every cell, every organ, every pathway, neuropathway, blood pathway. Everything in that body and raised it up to function. The same Spirit, okay, is within you and you need to recognize peace is just a second away. Joy is just a moment away. Healing is just a moment away. You've got to begin to believe the same Spirit that was upon Jesus, within Jesus. The same Spirit is within us and now we can function in a way that the world will stand in awe of us just like they did with the disciples.
Now, as we look in the Word of God, we find that the disciples went indeed the very same thing that Jesus did. Acts 19:11-12, "And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul. So that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them". I want you to notice that here he's talking about the presence of God flowing through Paul in unique ways because he was out amongst people in a unique way. In Acts we hear the story as well of Peter and he says it this way. Peter's walking by the man at the gate Beautiful. He's been there for decades. He's begging and he looks at Peter and he says, "Alms for the poor". Peter says, "Silver and gold have I none, but what I have, I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk". And he reaches out and the man jumping, laughing, leaping, was completely healed by the power of God.
As you look at these things and you study the book of Acts. You will notice that it's like Peter, what I have. Who did he have? Jesus. What did he use? The name of Jesus. Here's Paul, special miracles are working out of him. But it doesn't say that it was because he was specially called. It just says that they were needed, and they flowed out of him. Peter needed them. They flowed out of him. We've got to get the body of Christ to rise up and recognize. Stop feeling like the five-fold ministry are like Jesus and the rest of us are the sheep following Him around. No. The five-fold ministry are the coaches and the body of Christ. Every person with Jesus on the inside of them is called to go out and do what Jesus did. That's normal Christianity. Well, I hope you've enjoyed it today. I hope it encourages you. Tell someone about the show and watch it again next time as we continue at really helping people to rise up and be the phenomenal person God meant for you to be.