Six Sermons on the Olive - 6. The Golden Lamp and Its Goodly Lessons

Extract

Six Sermons on the Olive
C. H. Spurgeon

6. The Golden Lamp and Its Goodly Lessons “And the angel that talked with me came again, and waked me, as a man that is wakened out of his sleep, and said unto me, What seest thou? And I said, I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of gold, with a bowl upon the top of it, and his seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to the seven lamps, which are upon the top thereof: and two olive trees by it, one upon the right side of the bowl, and the other upon the left side thereof.” “And I answered again, and said unto him, What be these two olive branches which through the two golden pipes empty the golden oil out of themselves? And he answered me and said, Knowest thou not what these be? And I said, No, my lord. Then said he, These are the two anointed ones that stand by the Lord of the whole earth” Zechariah 4:1-3; 12-14.

The prophet, as he tells us in the introduction to his vision, had to be awakened by the angel as one is awakened out of his sleep. His mind was dull and heavy; perhaps he was weary and worn. Do you not often feel a similar lethargy, from which you need to be roused before your minds are equal to the study of those truths which God is revealing to your souls? May it not then be well, at the commencement of our meditation, to pray the Lord to waken us as a man is wakened out of his sleep? A divinely mysterious power can brood over us and quicken us out of languor. Have you never felt it? “Or ever I was aware my soul made me like the chariots of Ammi-nadib.” I had been slow before, but when the Spirit came, then was fulfilled that ancient proverb, “Draw me, and I will run after thee.” The touch of the Holy Spirit makes our faculties strong, our powers of thought are greatly enlarged, and we get the key of mysteries …