Prayer & Anointing 

What follows are Pastor Albert Chung's words as he led us in prayer. Just before Albert led in prayer from Isaiah 58, Trevor annointed Julie's head, hands, & feet. 

 

"As we come around Julie as her friends and family, the most significant support we can provide is spiritual—namely, prayer. Today, we want to do something special. We want to anoint her with oil. Oil has significant symbolic meaning in Scripture. 

 

First, we see that God used oil to consecrate, to set apart, his servants. He gave Moses and Aaron instructions to grind together a beautiful, aromatic, perfume like anointing oil. They would then pour it over the servant’s head to set them apart for God’s service. 

 

Second, we see that oil is a symbol of God’s blessing. Like wine and bread being the fruit of a good harvest and God’s blessing of favourable seasons, so too oil pressed from olives and the like was a literal picture of God’s blessing.

 

Third, we see that oil was a symbol of beauty in Scripture. There are many references to the oil of myrrh and the like being used to beautify the maiden.

 

So Julie, as we come around you as friends and family and anoint you with this oil, may you be strengthened in the knowledge that you are consecrated for God’s purposes. May you find power in the knowledge and experience of God’s blessing and provision. And may you be affirmed of your beauty in the sight of God—beautiful not only outwardly but inwardly with the gentle and quiet spirit that trusts God.

 

Let’s pray.

 

Isaiah 58:6-12

 

6 “Is not this the fast that I choose:

 to loose the bonds of wickedness,

to undo the straps of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,

and to break every yoke?

7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry

and bring the homeless poor into your house;

when you see the naked, to cover him,

 and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?

8 Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,

 and your healing shall spring up speedily;

 your righteousness shall go before you;

 the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.

9 Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;

you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am. ’

If you take away the yoke from your midst,

 the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,

10 if you pour yourself out for the hungry

and satisfy the desire of the afflicted,

 then shall your light rise in the darkness

and your gloom be as the noonday.

11 And the Lord will guide you continually

and satisfy your desire in scorched places

and make your bones strong;

and you shall be like a watered garden,

like a spring of water,

whose waters do not fail.

12 And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;

you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;

you shall be called the repairer of the breach,

the restorer of streets to dwell in.

 

Amen"

 

Albert Chung