Spiritual Hunger and Thirst

The next thing you need is spiritual hunger and thirst. Fleshly desires are easy. Maybe you want freedom from sickness.

We often take our health for granted. When everything is going great you don’t even think about your health until something serious hits you.

Suddenly the doctors are telling you that you have something serious that could shorten your life. It could take away the freedom that you have to do things that you enjoy. Now suddenly being well becomes a big priority to you.

Maybe you need freedom from poverty. If you have enough to get by you might become a bit complacent. You might say,

“I would like to have a lot more money, but we get enough to meet our needs and I can buy the things I want. We’re not wealthy but we are okay.”

Then financial lack hits you. Suddenly things go wrong, finances drop and you don’t have the income. Now suddenly wealth becomes a big priority to you, doesn’t it?

Then we have freedom from loneliness. We often take our marriage partner for granted. The longer you have been married, the more you take them for granted and you don’t realize what you have in that person.

Then suddenly things go wrong. There is a conflict in the marriage. A third party enters or maybe there is divorce or separation. Suddenly you realize how important it is for you to have that companionship. And now suddenly close relationships become a big priority to you.

What is it going to take to make you hungry? And what is it going to take to make you thirsty? If you are not hungry or thirsty, you are not knocking at heaven’s door and saying,

“Please, I’m starving. I’m dying of thirst.”

That is the kind of prayer that moves the hand of God. It is earnest passion and desire.

Spiritual Desires and Ministry

Spiritual desires are a bit different to natural desires, and these can actually lead to ministry. Maybe your experience with sickness stirs you up to realize that so many people are suffering. You cry out to the Lord and say,

“Lord, I know that you can heal. Take me and use me as a vessel of blessing, that I can bring healing for all of your children that are sick and dying.”

There are children who are being left as orphans because their parents are dying.

Perhaps your experience of financial lack stirs up a desire for you to say,

“Lord, I would like an anointing for prosperity. I would like to bless people. I would like to pray for them and see you work miraculously in their lives.”

Perhaps your experience with bad relationships makes you realize how important it is to minister to people. You want to minister to couples who need to come together and to deal with those who have marital problems.

You want to pray the power of God into peoples’ situations to set them free.

Perhaps it takes some of these things. And instead of looking at your own needs, you now project this into a desire to be used by God in ministry.

This is the main thing I want to emphasize here. It is having the power of God to minister to others.

Overcoming Bondages

We struggle in this world with our enemies. These are the world, the flesh (our sinful nature), and the devil with all his demons. Perhaps as you look at this, a desire arises within you to see believers overcoming this World System.

The church today is failing to meet the everyday needs of God’s people. Instead of receiving what they need, they are going to the world. And they are getting from the world what God could be giving them.

If there were just those who would stand up and be counted and say,

“Lord, I want you to anoint me. I want you to empower me and use me to minister to your people.”

Perhaps you desire to see people being delivered from spiritual bondage. You have seen those who are bound in sin and bound by demons.

They are bound by sinful habits that they can’t break free of, and no amount of counsel or encouragement seems to help. You need something more. You need the supernatural power of God to intervene in the lives of people and to bring change.

Then perhaps you see believers who have drifted away from the Lord and He is not that important to them anymore.

It is kind of like what happens in a marriage. When you first get married and you have that first love and that romantic, exciting love, it is so wonderful. But eventually, it grows stale.

Sometimes our relationship with the Lord grows stale and we drift away from Him. Perhaps you have the desire to see believers return to their first love.

Can you remember what it was first like when you fell in love? That is first love and it is a very special experience.

Moving in Revival Power

So how do you get people to come back to their first love for the Lord? Sometimes you want to take them and shake them and say,

“Wake up! Don’t you realize what you have?”

It is going to take the power of God to do that by a process known as revival. Everyone is praying for revival because of the good blessings that it brings. It brings members into the church and helps them to grow. The tithes also increase.

Everybody is praying for revival so that their ministry will flourish. But the true passion for revival is,

“Oh Lord, get your people to fall in love with you again, that they will return to their first love and their hearts will be stirred with a passion for you.”

That is the heart for revival, and it takes the power of the Holy Spirit to bring that. It takes the power of the Holy Spirit to make life exciting, not going out into the cesspools of this world and trying to get fun out there.

The Psalmist knew this. He said in Psalm 16:11,

You will make known to me the way to revival: in your presence [there is] joy that full satisfies; at your right hand [there are] pleasures that last forever.

It takes the anointing of God to accomplish these things in peoples’ lives. And it is going to take the anointing of God on you, for God to use you as a channel of His blessing and to influence the lives of other people.

You need God’s power to minister effectively. Perhaps at times you have wished that you could function in the gifts of the Spirit. Perhaps you wished you could preach with power.

Or maybe you would like to see lives changed when you pray for people; to see God touch them and transform them.

Perhaps you have looked at others who are being used by the Lord. You have looked at those who are called The Generals of the past. These were mighty men and women who were used so tremendously by the Lord in times past.

You look at the current spiritual leaders that are moving in God’s power and are being used by the Lord and you say,

“Oh Lord, I wish you could use me like you are using them. I wish you could use me like you used some of those generals of the past.”

How to Receive the Anointing

Is that desire strong enough in you? Is it an earnest desire and a passion? Then you have already fulfilled the first requirement to receive all of that anointing from the Lord.

But how do you get it? Sometimes you may feel left out and you say,

“I am just not one of the lucky ones.”

I’ve read the stories of all these people who are really used by the Lord, to try and somehow find out if there is a secret or principle that I can apply.

Sometimes there is just nothing. It’s just that for some reason God decided to use someone. At least that is what it looks like because I think nobody understands how they got there.

So you try to get closer to the Lord and you say,

“If God is going to use me in signs and wonders, to heal the sick and to transform peoples’ lives, then I need to walk very close to the Lord.”

Have you tried that? It doesn’t work, does it? You may have a wonderful time in the presence of the Lord and your own spiritual life is feeling good, but there is no power.

It doesn’t come that way. Somehow you just can’t break through to the power.

I started that way a long time ago. When the Lord called me in my early twenties at the age of 21, He placed His call on my life, and immediately I got a passion to be used by God.

I had great big visions of standing up and preaching to crowds, praying for people, and God doing amazing things. But nothing ever came easy.

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