Malachi 4:5 “See, I will send the prophet Elijah to you before that great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. 6 He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents; or else I will come and strike the land with total destruction.”
Referring to the ministry of John the Baptist even before he was conceived in his mother’s womb, the angel Gabriel said to John’s father Zechariah:
Luke 1:16 He will bring back many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. 17 And he will go on before the Lord, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous—to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”
John the Baptist appeared 2,000 years ago “in the spirit and power of Elijah to make ready a people prepared for the Lord,” that is, to prepare God’s people for the First Advent of the Messiah.
Malachi’s prophecy to be fulfilled again
But the spirit and power of Elijah will appear again a second time to fulfill Malachi’s prophecy once more before the Second Coming of the Messiah.
We are now in the great and terrible Last Days before the Second Coming of the Messiah—when Malachi’s prophecy regarding the coming of Elijah will be fulfilled a second time.
What is the purpose of “the spirit and power of Elijah”?
It is well known from 1 Kings 18 how the prophet Elijah boldly challenged the prophets of the false god Baal at Mt. Carmel.
1 Kings 18:24 Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire—he is God.”
This unprecedented bold challenge of course ended with Baal put to shame by the LORD in extraordinarily dramatic fashion. Only then did the backslidden Baal-worshiping Israelites acknowledge the LORD.
1 Kings 18:24 When all the people saw this, they fell prostrated and cried, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!”
The spirit and power of Elijah being restored today
In the same way, the spirit and power of Elijah is being restored to the Church today for preparing God’s lukewarm, complacent people for the Second Coming of the Messiah—and to fulfill Matthew 24:14 as well—“And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”
Today The Elijah Challenge is training the Lord’s disciples to proclaim the kingdom of God with the very same boldness and manifest power which Elijah displayed at Mt. Carmel before the false prophets and backslidden Israelites.
We train disciples to heal the sick boldly with power and authority as Jesus commanded his disciples in Luke 10:9—as indisputable and compelling evidence to both non-believers and backslidden believers alike that the Kingdom of God has come near and is at hand.
Luke 10:9 “Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘the kingdom of God has come near to you.’ “
The mission of The Elijah Challenge is to train the Church to make ready a people prepared for the Lord during these Last Days—fulfilling the Great Commission.
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Overview of The Elijah Challenge