There is Oil for that

Intro:

As we embark upon and continue in a new year, God is causing us to reflect upon our prior attitudes, activities, and accolades. Many of us lament that we cannot do what we used to do, and go where we used to go. Limitations due to this pandemic has enthralled us, because we feel like we are imprisoned. Many of us feel like this, because our external living was more important than our internal connections. Our titles, friends, connections, and entertainment was paramount in our lives, and now God has allowed much of that to be shut down. Now preachers who preached in packed out churches and venues are now relegated to a red dot on a camera, and hope that folks will tune in. Churches who would normally be busting at the seams needing parking attendants, security, and an army of a welcome team now only need a key or a code for a few to get in. Movie theatres are empty for the most part. Kids are playing ball in semi-empty gyms and/or semi-empty stands. People are going to work relegated to their own department or office, and/or simply work from home. Yet while many are secluded, we have the essential crowd thrown into the vice of this pandemic. They are walking into hospitals and rooms full of the pandemic. They are entering homes with people who they know are ill with Covid-19. They are cleaning floors, cooking food, doing transactions, and defending this nation all while holding on to the hope that a mask will protect them from the deadliest thing we have ever faced. Let us make sure that we don’t lose perspective church that if it had not been for the Lord who was on our side where would we be. Yes if was not for God’s grace the fate that many have faced and the difficulties that many are facing right now, we would be in the same predicament. We need God to put some Oil on us. We need God’s healing ointment like never before. We need God to heal us of Racism, division, hate, supremacy, ignorance, and SIN! But in order for God to anoint us we need somebody to be OILY!!!! Tell someone near you that we need some oil!!

Context:

The last couple of years I have noticed young people would refer to swag as dripping. If you wear the right clothes, speak the right language, or just be good in your own skin so to speak you are dripping. If you have the right jewelry, the right car, and the right position you are dripping. I often wondered about this, because it intrigued me. The urban dictionary says dripping isWhen something or someone is really cool, or has so much swag to it. So when I would hear young folks talk about preachers who had swag they would say that they are Oily! He or she is Oily! In my understanding Oily is that preacher swag, and usually resonates with their sound, look, and status. All of these things that have been focused on are things that are external, but no one seems to really get what’s really important and that is what’s going on internally! Anoint comes from the Hebrew word Masah which means to rub oil on, smear with oil, or to place oil. In ancient times in the East anointing was a common practice. Generally it was used for several purposes to heal, to make sacred or sacramental, or appoint for office. Anointing is a physical recognition of a divine call or action. God heals, God makes it sacred for God’s use, and God anoints and appoints. As Israel was becoming a nation in this text God is showing them how to be a nation and also how to worship. The awesome thing with worship is you need to truly Oily if you want God to show up! God called Moses and his assistant Joshua along with Aaron, hur, and the priest up into the mountain of God. I want you to notice something Moses went all the way up, and Joshua was close behind him. Aaron and the priest went only to a certain point. Watch this. Moses was talking directly to God and Joshua may have been close enough to hear, because of their role they needed to hear God directly. See leadership needs to hear from God and know God’s instructions, but the priest were only allowed to go so far. Watch this because their job was to be the go between God and the people. Notice God placed the priest between God and the children of Israel. Which brings me to a point stay in your place, because you place has a purpose! Many times we want the shine, the drip, the swag of another position, but many times we have no clue how much that drip costs! The priest saw and heard as God spoke with Moses. They heard the thunders roaring, and they saw the consuming fire and the foot of God passing through, because needed them to know he was with them too. Sometimes the reason we fail is because we move outside of our Oil and try to make moves for ourselves, but I want to tell somebody no matter what station you are in or where you are serving right now if God puts the oil on you it will rise!

So God instructs Moses on how to set everything up from the ten commandments, the ark of the covenant, the tabernacle, the ephod, the lampstand, offerings, table for showbread, the gold lampstand, the altar, and the court of the temple, priestly garments, and the breastplate. These were all objects, but God saved for last the things that needed Oil on them. See everything God had instructed for it’s purpose, but everything that God put Oil on was Holy unto the Lord. I need someone to get that. A lot of people want to anointed and don’t know what anointing really means. To be anointed means more than a shout. To be anointed is more than speaking in tongues. To be anointed means more than a praise break. To be anointed means more than driving a nice car. To be anointed means more than to preach a good sermon in which the people shout. To be anointed means more than to sing a song and folks cry or respond with veracity. To anointed means to be set aside for God’s service. So if you want to be anointed make sure you want to sanctified, and to be sanctified means to be set apart. Which means you can no longer live like you want, but now you have to reserve yourself, your identity, and your life for His service! That is not always a bad thing, but it definitely isn’t just about dripping either!

Close:

Notice in the text as I move close to my close that Moses is instructed with what is a necessary recipe for God’s Holy anointing oil. Spices, myrrh, sweet cinnamon, sweet cane, cassia, and olive oil. Notice that first God gives ingredients and instructions, because sometimes you can have the ingredients, but not have the right instructions. You can have the right building, but the wrong leadership. You can have the right car, but put the wrong gas in it. You can have the right clothes, but don’t follow the instructions on how to clean them and ruin them. You can have the right praise team, the right musicians, the right worship leader, the right choir, the right name on the door, but don’t follow or have the right instructions you are still in a mess. Not only did God tell him what to make out of, but God told Moses how to mix it. He said compound it like a perfumer. This word compound in Hebrew is mirchat which means to mix or to process! There it is church even if we have the right ingredients we have to go through the process! Holiness comes out of the process. Yall don’t hear me! Not only did God give him the ingredients and tell him the process, God also told him what to anoint! God instructed Moses to anoint the tabernacle of meeting which is the church. Anoint the ark, anoint the table and it’s utensils, the lampstand and its utensils, the alter of incense, the altar of burnt offering and it’s utensils, laver and it’s base. These were all objects that needed God’s holy oil. All of these objects pertained to worship, so everything for worship needs to be anointed! It needs to be sanctified, or set apart for God and God alone. Then God said who ever touches them must be holy. So then God instructed Moses to anoint Aaron and his sons and to consecrate them as priests unto the Lord! God could not just have oil for the objects, but God needed to put oil on someone who could use the objects. Can I close? Somebody help me say Oil for that. God wants to anoint the church in 2021 so that we can be Oily for the nation and our community. There is Oil for that! Racism, Hate, Division, Cleansing, Deliverance, and even the church there is oil for that. But before I go I want to inform some young folks in here. Just because you get oily and that is good, but don’t forget where the oil came from. See the oil came from God, but everything and everyone that was anointed was anointed by the Leader and Pastor Moses! Don’t forget where you got your oil from!