Women - The Anointing Makes Room For You!

 
              By Carol Arnott       

Women of God, the Lord is calling you to a special purpose. He wants you to fulfill your potential and complete the work He has called you to do. I want to share with you on this subject because I see many women holding back, fearful of assuming their God-given roles in the Body.

In these days of refreshing, God is breathing new life into our hearts, and is waking the Church to the vast potential of women as soldiers in His spiritual army. He is preparing us to take up the sword of His Spirit and go forth as warriors, anointed and empowered alongside our male companions.

We mustn't be fearful of that calling, nor must we try to see it realized in our own strength. God Himself heals, equips, and fills us with His anointing. He empowers us and releases us in service and ministry.

This past year when, my husband, John and I visited Dr. Yonggi Cho's church in Korea, we saw how the Body of Christ can benefit from allowing women to assume leadership roles. When Dr. Cho discovered the value of women in ministry, he tapped into a gold mine of spiritual power. Eighty percent of the small group leaders in his church of 700,000 are women. It took courage and God's leading for Dr. Cho to appoint women to such responsible ministry roles -- this is in a culture where women are required to demonstrate their submission to male supremacy by walking five or six steps behind them in public.

A combination of factors has held us back: the sense of inadequacy that many women struggle with coupled with past Church teaching. Jesus' heart is to heal and restore. I know, because Jesus drew me in and healed me. When I met and married John, I was like a frightened little girl. Hurting as a child, defeated and aching from the pain of divorce, a struggling single mother, I never envisioned myself speaking to thousands the world over. And yet, by God's grace, He has restored me, filled me, and empowered me for service. He saw potential in me where I saw none. He has used me since to minister in ways I could never imagine.

For centuries Church tradition has restricted women in ministry through oppression, fear, and woundedness. In many societies women have been among the most lonely and outcast. But the Bible records many instances where God made room for them even when the Church and the world would have rejected them.

In the Old Testament we read of Ruth the Moabitess whom God favoured, though Jews were to have nothing to do with people from her country. Because of her servant's heart, Ruth wanted to bless and help her mother-in-law, Naomi. As a result, God anointed her with favour and arranged for her to marry Boaz, a leading citizen. Their son Obed was King David's grandfather and Ruth was listed in the genealogy of Jesus.

Jesus did much to champion the freedom of women. In His culture, where women were sold as wives, He allowed women to minister to Him. Women kept vigil at the cross and were first at the tomb; in fact Jesus first appeared to a woman who had had seven demons cast out of her, seemingly a sign of how he accepted all people. Women, commissioned by an angel to tell the disciples the good news that Jesus had risen, became the first evangelists.

The anointing restored me to follow God's call and He will do the same for you. The Lord drew my attention to how God restores women as I listened to a pastor's wife share her testimony. She spoke of being wounded, hurting and withdrawn, and told how during church services she sat at the back ready to slip out when the sermon ended.

Through extended prayer that allowed her to soak in the anointing, Jesus healed, strengthened, and transformed her into a passionate woman in the Spirit.

When renewal was in about its third week and I had been continually absorbing God's presence, I saw a vision that underscored the importance of soaking in the Spirit. In the vision I was in a huge banqueting hall in heaven with Jesus. Tables laden with flowers, crystal, china, candelabras and gigantic trays of gourmet food extended as far as I could see. "This is the wedding feast of the Lamb," I thought, but couldn't see any wedding guests until I turned around. Then before me were multitudes of the most glowing and radiant people I had ever seen. They were wearing beautiful wedding garments and their faces shone like Moses' face would have after he encountered God. "Lord," I gasped, "who are these people?" "They are the broken, the outcast, the downtrodden. They are the hurting and unloved. I have beckoned them to come to my banquet," He replied. Then He said, "Tell the people the wedding feast is almost prepared and this is a time when I'm pouring out the oil of my Spirit. Tell them they must be like the five wise virgins who bought extra oil. This is a time to buy extra oil. I am pouring out my oil upon my people and I will keep filling them. They will become saturated, and then I will spill them out into the highways and byways, and my presence will be on them, and the lost will come into the banquet feast." God lavishes his oil on us as Mary did on Jesus' feet.

Don't let anyone say to you: For heaven's sake, you've been soaking for seven months. Can't you get up and get going? Let God soak you in the anointing oil of His Spirit, following the example of Esther. Because they were Jews, Esther and her uncle Mordecai were despised. However, when she was a candidate to become queen of Persia and Media, she spent a year preparing to see the king. The beauty regime included soaking in oils and fragrances, which today we see as symbolic of the Holy Spirit's healing and anointing. Esther was an orphan with no training and no credentials, but God granted her favour with the king who chose her to be queen. Like Esther, through renewal we have been soaking in the oil of the Spirit. Let me encourage you with others' stories.

In 1876, God called Maria Woodworth Etter, a little lady from the Brethren church, whose tradition doesn't allow women to speak in meetings, to preach. She had no qualifications and no Bible school training, and no one to teach her God's Word. God Himself taught her, highlighting passages of scripture. All her children but one, died, yet she retained no bitterness. She trusted God and was mightily used of Him as a sign and wonder. One day while preaching she froze on the spot, revived some time later, and continued preaching exactly where she left off. She was just an ordinary mom and housewife, but the anointing transformed her.

A Canadian, Amy Semple-MacPherson, felt called to missions. She married and went to China, but not long after, her husband died. Returning home, she learned about the Holy Spirit, and soaked in His presence. He anointed her mightily. Under her radical ministry multitudes were saved and healed. She drew crowds on street corners until her meetings outgrew the location. Eventually she founded the Four Square denomination, which now has churches the world over. Not long ago a woman from Japan visited TACF. She had been a prostitute, but Jesus found her, touched and healed her, and set her on fire for Him. She is now a pastor. Her heart broken for the lost, she pastors a downtown church in a large city ministering powerfully in the Spirit. She came to Toronto repeatedly to be filled with the Spirit, and returned to give it out. Someone once asked her how she got so powerfully anointed. "I've been soaking at the feet of Jesus," she said. "I let Him pour the oil of His presence into me again and again."

John says the frightened little girl he married has become a warrior. I know it hasn't happened in my strength. The anointing made room for me. I don't have gifts, abilities and talents. I have no Bible College training, nor do I have a college degree, but Jesus gave me a place and a calling. I only have Jesus, God the Father and His Holy Spirit. If Jesus took His Holy Spirit from me, I would again be that frightened little girl.

Let God fill you with Himself, marinate you and rub you all over with His perfume so that you will look like Jesus, act like Jesus and minister like Jesus.