I believe the Lord has provided ministers for His Church. They are called to give themselves to the Word and to prayer so that they can equip the believers who are on the front lines and ministering on behalf of Jesus. Not everyone stands in front of the congregation or teaches a group, but everyone IS a minister, and everyone who daily obeys the Lord is walking in a holy calling. Anyone who loves people like Jesus loved, who is hard-working and honest, who shares his faith with others, and who lives a clean life can know that the expression of their life is as powerful as any other calling.
That being said, a season like the stay-at-home orders we’re living under right now provide a great opportunity to learn how to receive truth from the Lord by His Holy Spirit. It’s a good time to learn to not be completely dependent upon others when reading the Bible. 1 John 2:27 says, “The anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him (1John 2:27). Here is a promise of God that the Holy Spirit is available to every believer. The word given here to describe the work of the Holy Spirit is “anointing.” This is a reference to oil being poured or smeared upon an object to make it able and appointed to receive the work of God within it. The anointing equipped the object or person to function in God’s purpose. Here we read that every believer can have confidence that when he or she honestly seeks truth and asks the Holy Spirit to guide him in the Scriptures, that God will be faithful to “anoint” him so that he is able to receive everything he needs to know from God’s word. 1 John tells us that this anointing is rooted in truth and will not reveal a lie. This is true for every believer.
Someone might be concerned that it opens the door to deception, but Jesus promised that those who ask God for fish would not be handed a snake; therefore, anyone who asks the Father for the Holy Spirit will receive the Holy Spirit (Luke 11:10-13). The person without ulterior motives and sincerely asks his heavenly Father for the ability to understand the Scriptures will receive the truth from God. That’s a promise! We want to grow in the Lord until we reach the point that we embrace God’s teachers in the Church, but we absolutely rely on the confirmation of our “anointing” from God and on the Scriptures themselves to confirm the teaching of any Bible teacher.
This season is a great opportunity to learn how to hear from God through his word. My prayer is that we would maximize this downtime and fully give ourselves to receive the anointing of the Lord for the truth. What a blessing to be a follower of Jesus Christ!