Sons of Fresh Oil

And a second time I answered and said to him, "What are these two branches of the olive trees, which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out?" He said to me, "Do you not know what these are?" I said, "No, my lord." Then he said, "These are the two anointed ones [lit. Sons of New Oil] who stand by the Lord of the whole earth." (Zec 4:12-14)


Tony Ling brought a fantastic word to Living Rock Church on Sunday. It was a key word for us. I'll add a link to the audio as soon as someone [probably me! ;-)] puts it up on the LRC website.

It excited me for several reasons. I'm always stirred when Tony speaks. He is a man who carries the anointing of God, and there is something about his prophetic gift that always sparks something in my spirit. I was also strirred because so much of what he shared resonated with what the Spirit has been communicating to me in my own meditations in the word.

Tony spoke about the Spirit and Power of Elijah, and how this relates to the ministry of the Church who are preparing the way for the Lord by restoring all things. The fact that Elijah is a type and pattern of the church is something I am utterly convinced of from my own studies in the word. I even wrote a short paper on it. Tony shared how on Mount Carmel Elijah brought restoration to a people who had "rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death" (1Ki 19:10) This he linked to the "Way of God" (the Lordship of Jesus), the "Worship of God" and the "Word of God". He then went on to talk about Elijah's cloak, and how it represented his prophetic anointing. In a fantastic parallel he linked how this cloak floated down to the ground after Elijah ascended, and anointed Elisha to continue his ministry, to how the Spirit was outpoured after Jesus ascended, and how we are cloathed with power from on high, to enable us to continue the works of Jesus. I was chuffed because of these four things: the Lordship of Christ, the worship of God, the word of God, and the anointing of the Holy Spirit; I had preached on three of these the previous week. Three out of four ain't bad! ;-) It's great when you hear the word of God when you prepare to preach, but it's even better when you have this confirmed. From the mouths of two or three witnesses a thing is firmly established.

On the subject of the two witnesses. Once you see that Elijah is a type for the prophetic ministry of the church, you can also follow that the two witnesses in Revelation 11 (who perform the miracles of Moses and Elijah) also correspond to the witness of the church in the world. This in turn corresponds with the visions of the prophet Zechariah, which I had just been reading that morning!

As a church, as God's prophetic people, God is clearly speaking to us at the moment. We need to be sons of fresh oil. We need a daily anointing with his Spirit to get his job done, just as surely as we need the daily bread of his word. If we are serious about being a part of God's plan to impact the world, and bring in his kingdom there is just no substitute for the anointing of the Holy Spirit.

“This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts." (Zec 4:6)