Subject: Anointing: When It Does Not Work

Hi John:

I just want to encourage you to continue anointing your house, especially your person and your room. To not do this cannot lead to anything good. You know its value, you experienced it in the beginning. You are frustrated with it because it doesn’t always work when you want it to work. When it doesn’t work, abandoning it is not the solution, what you need to do is seek God to show you why at the moment you are not protected. You need to do this immediately. Putting it off will make it harder and harder to turn to the Lord to get to the root problem.

Anointing and the armor of God only works when we are walking in obedience to God.  "Submit therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you" (James 4:7).  There are many reasons your anointing may not protect you:

1. You might be protected, but there is a crack (area of disobedience) in your armor and Satan has gotten through. If this is true, the Lord has allowed it to expose this crack in your armor so you will seek Him so he can show you what the crack is so you can close it.

"Therefore this iniquity will be to you like a breach about to fall, a bulge in a high wall, whose collapse comes suddenly in an instant." (Isaiah 30:13)

2. You might have sinned in some way and not confessed it to the Lord. This is a doorway. Until you confess it and receive God’s forgiveness, you won’t be able to close this doorway or have authority over Satan.

"‘Woe to the rebellious children,’ declares Yehovah, ‘who execute a plan, but not Mine, and make an alliance, but not of My Spirit, in order to add sin to sin.’" (Isaiah 30:1)

"But He who doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and whatever is not from faith is sin." (Romans 14:23)

"Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do, and does not do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17)

"Behold, Yehovah’s hand is not so short that it cannot save; neither is His-ear so dull that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your-Elohim, and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He does not hear." (Isaiah 59:1-2)

"He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion." (Proverbs 28:13)

"He who sows iniquity will reap vanity, and the rod of his fury will perish." (Proverbs 22:8)

3. You might be exposing yourself to something which gives Satan a doorway. When I am having a problem with lust, more often than not it is because I am allowing myself to be exposed to something on TV which is weakening me morally. This is a doorway. The only way to close it to avoid it completely. I have had to do turn away from many TV programs and not watch them anymore for this reason. You don’t want any open doors in your life, the TV show is not worth what it will cost you spiritually.

"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind, dwell on these things. The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things; and the God of peace shall be with you." (Phil 4:8-9)

"But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in regard to its lusts." (Romans 13:14)

"Abstain from every form of evil." (1 Thessalonians 5:22)

"I want you to be wise in what is good, and innocent in what is evil." (Romans 16:19)

4. Another reason maybe that God has commanded you to do something and you haven’t obeyed him in. God’s word says in James 4:7 "Submit therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you." If we are not submitting ourselves to Jesus’ will and Lordship over our lives, we are already in the camp of the enemy, he is free to do with us whatever he pleases because we have removed God’s protection through our rebellion. The solution is to repent and confess our sin to the Lord and go back and obey him.

"Has Yehovah as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of Yehovah? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of divination, And insubordination is as iniquity and idolatry." (1 Samuel 15:22-23)

"He who digs a pit will fall into it, and whoever breaks a hedge a serpent will bite him." (Ecclesiastes 10:8)

"If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (1 John 1:9)

5. Another reason may be that you are rejecting God’s messenger and looking for counselors that support your desire. This will open a door also. God says in James 4:10 "Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and he will exalt you." You need to pray and ask the Lord to show you who He wants you listening too. John, you are not mature enough spiritually to always fight these battles alone. If you find you are not getting victory, God’s word is the following:

"Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you; and considering the result of their conduct, imitate their faith." (Hebrews 13:7)

"The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things; and the God of peace shall be with you." (Phil 4:9)

John, Jesus put me in your life to help you. Don’t push me away or avoid me, I am an e-mail or phone call away.

John, if anointing isn’t working, abandoning it is not the answer. You abandon it because you don’t want to repent of the sin that is keeping it from working in your life, and when you do that you are catering to the demons that influenced you to sin in the first place. This is not a solution. You need to stop whatever you are doing and get on your knees and cry out to the Lord to show you what the problem is in your life that is keeping the anointing from working in your life until He shows you what it is, not stop anointing. Then confess and repent of it and then re-anoint yourself, your home and whatever else is appropriate and get back under God’s protection. John, this is what I do when the anointing doesn’t work. The anointing isn’t the problem, something in me is. I seek the Lord until I know what it is and repent and get right with God and then re-anoint myself and my home and repute on the armor of God.

John, if you don’t get to the root cause of your frustration, sin, or Satanic attack, crying out to God for His strength against the sin will not solve the problem. First, you need to ask the Lord to show you what the sin you see is rooted in, what the doorway is to Satan's attack. Until you know the answer to that, and confess and repent of that, no seeking of God’s grace against the sin you see will help. Joshua was called of God to lead Israel into the promised land. As long as Israel obeyed God, they had complete victory over their enemies, but if just one person in the camp sinned, they would be slaughtered by their enemies. This happened once and Joshua sought the Lord about what the problem was. God showed him their was sin in the camp and that until it was removed, they would not have victory over their enemies. Once God shows you what the root sin is and you confess and repent of it, then asking God for his grace, strength and power against that sin will work, but only then and under these conditions. When you take care of the root sin, you will find the symptom sin will no longer be an issue.

John, if you are having a problem with a sin, the answer is not to avoid me or your brothers, share with us so we can join with you in prayer for God to give you the grace, strength and power to overcome your problem. If you can’t hear God’s voice, we can seek Him and get an answer for you. When you are blinded spiritually by sin, it is very difficult to hear God’s voice (Isaiah 59:1-2). Also when you are in a storm, you can’t hear God’s voice (Psalm 32:6).

"Behold, Yehovah’s hand is not so short that it cannot save; neither is His-ear so dull that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your-Elohim, and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He does not hear." (Isaiah 59:1-2)

"Therefore, let everyone who is godly pray to You in a time when You may be found; surely in a flood of great waters they shall not reach him." (Psalm 32:6)

6. Finally, John, realize that a lot of your frustration centers in your being focused on your desire instead of on the Lord. James wrote,

"What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. And you are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: ‘He desires to jealously the spirit which He has made to dwell in us’? But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, ‘God battles-against the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’ Submit therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you." (James 4:1-7)

What is God’s instruction to you? Hebrews 12:1 "Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us." John, when you allow yourself to be weighed down by the lusts of your flesh and the things of the world, you have no strength left to seek God and focus on his will. The Bible’s instruction is to rid yourself of those things not of Him, the sin that entangles you, the source, separate yourself from it.

"Do not be bound together with unbelievers, for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Therefore, come out from their midst and be separated,’ says the Lord. ‘And do not touch what is unclean, and I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,’ says the Lord Almighty." (2 Corinthians 6:14-18)

When you play with sin and with what is not God’s will, it will weigh you down, so much so, suddenly, you are no longer strong enough to fight off spiritual forces, suddenly you no longer have strength to spend time with the Lord and seek Him. You need to rid yourself of these weights. You need to seek the Lord to show you what in your life is not of Him, is weighing you down, what you need to get rid of and separate yourself from. David prayed to the Lord in Psalm 51:10 "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me."