How do you activate the power of partnership? As a believer, God calls you to carry out the deeds of Jesus, moving beyond an ordinary natural existence. God supplies His supernatural power through individuals whom He has uniquely anointed. Ephesians 4:11, written by Paul, states that God “bestowed some as apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, to perfect the saints, perform the work of the ministry, and edify the body of Christ.”
According to the verse, it’s the saints (or believers) who are responsible for carrying out the work of the ministry. The role of the fivefold ministers is to assist in preparing them for this task and in cultivating the Body of Christ. The Greek term ‘Christ’ refers to the Anointed One and His Anointing. When mentioned alone in the Scriptures, it emphasizes the significance of the anointing. God’s intention is for believers to operate on Earth as the anointed body of Jesus.
The Anointing of Christ
Jesus’ life shows the power of partnership. When Christ came to earth, He laid aside His divine power as a member of the godhead. So, while He was here, He didn’t minister as God but as a man. Jesus baptised with the Holy Spirit and power. That’s why we, as believers, can expect to follow in His footsteps. It’s why He could say in John 14:12: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do.”
This was Jesus’ way of saying that all of us as believers are to grow up in His Anointing and do His supernatural works. How is that going to happen? It’s going to happen as we come together in Christ. For as Ephesians 4:16 says: “From [Him] the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love”
Joints In Christ
Jesus is the head of The Body of Christ, yet it’s the joints that hold it together through their contributions. What exactly is a joint? It’s the point where body parts connect, enabling them to function collectively
One of the reasons the Body of Christ has been slow to fully grow up into the Anointing of Jesus is we’ve had joint problems! Too many believers neglect to ask God who they ought to partner with. As a result, they do not come alongside ministers and ministries God calls to connect with. When we do not join in the Kingdom business, we miss out the anointing that covenant partnership supplies.
In the natural, when two oxen are yoked together to a plow it creates a synergy that enables those two oxen to pull with the power of three. As God put it in Leviticus 26:8, “Five of you shall chase an hundred, and an hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight.”
That’s the power of biblical partnership!
Partnership In The Early Church
Paul’s partners in Philippi knew the full power of the anointing and The BLESSING that was on Paul. Their church was a result of it. When Paul and Silas were chained in the local prison, they were praising God and praying. The anointing on them was so strong it caused an earthquake. All the prisoners’ chains fell off, the prison doors flew open, and the jailer started crying out asking how to be saved. Paul told him, and he got born again.
Historians believe that jailer became the pastor of the Philippian church. So, no doubt, the whole congregation remembered that incident. They understood that when Paul referred to the grace that was on him for the defence and confirmation of the gospel he was talking about signs and wonders. Can you imagine how thrilled the Philippians must have been to hear that because they’d partnered with Paul in ministry. The anointing that was on him was now on them too?
Partakers of the Anointing
Grace is God’s supernatural empowerment and supply. It includes the anointing that’s on a person and THE BLESSING they walk in. Partnership is like everything else in the kingdom of God, you walk in it by faith. And faith comes by hearing The WORD of God. So spend time meditating on scriptures about spiritual partnership. Open your Bible to Genesis 12, for instance, where God spoke to Abram about how spiritual partnership works, and said:
“I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed” (verses 2-3).
Rearrange the language in those verses a little and you’ll see they contain the same principle Paul wrote about in Philippians. You’ll see that God essentially said to Abram, “I’ve BLESSED you and called you to be a BLESSING to the world, and anyone who helps you in that ministry of BLESSING will be BLESSED with the same BLESSING that’s on you.”
When the Apostle Paul wrote his Philippian partners, he talked about all of those things. He told them they were partakers of his anointing. He told them the fruit of his ministry would be credited to their heavenly account (Philippians 4:17). And he said, “MY God shall supply all your need”—in other words He’ll supply yours just as He does mine, at the level of an apostle—“according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (verse 19, NKJV).
That’s the power of partnership. Tap in to it by faith!
