WRITING to the congregation of anointed Christians in Corinth, the apostle Paul said that God has “put his seal upon us and has given us the token of what is to come, that is, the spirit, in our hearts.”​—2 Cor. 1:21, 22.

How do those who have been anointed by God to be his heavenly sons and who receive the sealing of the spirit manifest this? Is it possible for someone to think that he or she is thus anointed and yet be mistaken?

There is an evident need for Scriptural understanding of these points. For example, in a few congregations in one large country of Africa, certain persons attending the celebration of the Lord’s Evening Meal partook for the first time and were seen to shake visibly or to make other unusual movements while partaking. Is this in harmony with the Scriptures as to the way God’s spirit acts toward those anointed? Is it evidence of his spirit in the hearts of such ones, giving them a “token” or foretaste of the heavenly sonship to which they are called?

The answer to these questions must be No.

RECEIVING A TRUE SPIRIT OF SONSHIP

How, then, does God’s holy spirit operate toward those whom he anoints? Romans 8:15-17 tells us, saying: “For you did not receive a spirit of slavery causing fear again, but you received a spirit of adoption as sons, by which spirit we cry out: ‘Abba, Father!’ The spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are God’s children. If, then, we are children, we are also heirs: heirs indeed of God, but joint heirs with Christ, provided we suffer together that we may also be glorified together.”

Similarly, at Galatians 4:6, 7, we read: “Now because you are sons, God has sent forth the spirit of his Son into our hearts and it cries out: ‘Abba, Father!’ So, then, you are no longer a slave but a son; and if a son, also an heir through God.”

Therefore the principal evidence one anointed to the heavenly calling has is this spirit or dominant sense of sonship, that is, of having been begotten by God to spiritual sonship as one of the 144,000 heirs of the heavenly kingdom. One genuinely begotten can testify in all good conscience that the heavenly hopes produced in him are not born of his own desires or imaginations but are from Jehovah God, the result of His spirit’s action toward such a one. (1 Pet. 1:3, 4; Rev. 14:1-3)