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- Malachi
4:5 "See, I will send you the prophet Elijah
before that great and dreadful day of the LORD comes.
- Revelation
11:3 And I will give power to my two witnesses, and they will
prophesy
for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth." 4 These are the
two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before
the Lord of the earth.
5 If anyone tries to harm them, fire comes from their mouths
and devours their enemies. This is how anyone who wants
to harm them must die. 6
These men have power to shut up the sky so
that it will not rain during the time they are prophesying;
and they have power to turn the
waters into blood and to strike the earth with every kind
of plague
as often as they want.
- 1
Kings 17:1 Now Elijah the Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead,
said to Ahab, “As
the LORD, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there
will be neither dew nor rain in the next
few years except at my word.”
It
appears that the two witnesses prophesied in
Revelation have the spirit of Elijah (and Moses),
for like
Elijah in the Old
Testament,
they also are given power to shut up the sky. Some
believe that we are now in the "days of Elijah," when
the spirit that the Lord gave to Elijah is
being restored to the Church. We believe that
the two
witnesses of Revelation are not necessarily two
specific individuals,
but might represent an army of nameless and faceless
Elijah-like disciples who will have great power
to witness for Christ in these
last days.
They
will
have
power to demonstrate to the world that Jesus Christ
is indeed the Son of God through powerful miraculous
signs. However, when the age
of grace is over and the age of judgement begins,
the ministry of the witnesses on earth at that
time
will not be preaching
the gospel, but of bringing judgment upon
the
earth according to the verses in Revelation above.
The
purpose of the spirit of Elijah in this present dispensation
is to proclaim the gospel with great power and boldness leading
to the prompt fulfillment of Christ's Great Commission.
In
1 Kings 18, Elijah challenges the servants of the false god Baal
to a "power
encounter." When Baal fails to deliver, Elijah calls upon the
name of the Lord, who answers with a miraculous sign---fire from heaven.
- 1
Kings 18:39 When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate
and cried, "The LORD-he is God! The LORD-he is God!"
In
the same way, God is restoring the spirit of Elijah to His Church
so that we may proclaim to the nations that "my God is the
true God, and I will demonstrate that to you in the power of
miraculous signs." These signs are generally miraculous
healings.
The
New Testament teaches that believers who are sent to preach
the gospel have been given a measure of authority to
heal diseases and cast out demons to confirm the gospel of
Jesus Christ.
- Luke
9:1 When Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them
power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases,
2 and he sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to
heal the sick.
6 So they set out and went from village
to village, preaching the gospel and healing people everywhere.
-
Luke
10:1 After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and
sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place
where he was about to go.
9 Heal the sick who are there
and tell them, 'The kingdom of God is near you.' 17 The seventy-two
returned with joy and said, "Lord, even the demons submit
to us in your name.
The
mission of The
Elijah Challenge is to teach missionaries, church planters,
evangelists, and believers how, in a consistent fashion,
to demonstrate through miraculous signs and healings that
Jesus Christ is the Son of the true God.
The
spirit of Elijah proclaims to the world, "My
God is the true God, and by His grace I will demonstrate
it to you in power."
Training with the The Elijah Challenge
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