Morning, August 28
Go To Evening Reading
“Oil for the light.”
Exodus 25:6
My soul, how much thou needest this, for thy lamp will not long continue
to burn without it. Thy snuff will smoke and become an offence if
light be gone, and gone it will be if oil be absent. Thou hast no
oil well springing up in thy human nature, and therefore thou must
go to them that sell and buy for thyself, or like the foolish virgins,
thou wilt have to cry, “My lamp is gone out.” Even the consecrated lamps could not give light without oil; though
they shone in the tabernacle they needed to be fed, though no rough
winds blew upon them they required to be trimmed, and thy need is
equally as great. Under the most happy circumstances thou canst not
give light for another hour unless fresh oil of grace be given thee.
It was not every oil that might be used in the Lord’s service; neither the petroleum which exudes so plentifully from
the earth, nor the produce of fishes, nor that extracted from nuts
would be accepted; one oil only was selected, and that the best olive
oil. Pretended grace from natural goodness, fancied grace from priestly
hands, or imaginary grace from outward ceremonies will never serve
the true saint of God; he knows that the Lord would not be pleased
with rivers of such oil. He goes to the olive-press of Gethsemane,
and draws his supplies from him who was crushed therein. The oil of
gospel grace is pure and free from lees and dregs, and hence the light
which is fed thereon is clear and bright. Our churches are the Saviour’s golden candelabra, and if they are to be lights in this dark world, they
must have much holy oil. Let us pray for ourselves, our ministers,
and our churches, that they may never lack oil for the light. Truth,
holiness, joy, knowledge, love, these are all beams of the sacred
light, but we cannot give them forth unless in private we receive
oil from God the Holy Ghost.