It’s all I can hear. It’s all I can see.
Fire.
Everywhere. Everything.
This morning during my barn time, the Spirit brought me to Exodus 3:1-8, then to Acts 2:1-6. As I read, I thought about the day a few years ago on October 12, 2018, I was praying by my bedside, I had my eyes closed and I saw a woman made of fire. It was just a brief flash, a quick snapshot, but her hair was made of flowing fire, her eyes were flames of fire, her gown was flowing tendrils of fire. My understanding was that this is what we look like in the spiritual realm. During that season of my life, the Spirit kept communicating, “To withstand the fire, you must become the fire.”
As I read the passages in Exodus and Acts this morning, the Spirit reiterated our destiny with fire. We will all meet it one way or another, it is inescapable. God appeared to Moses as fire when He heard the cries of His people and came down to deliver them. Do not let the spiritual weight of that be lost upon you beloved-- Jesus is coming back with fire (2 Peter 3:10,11). Then, thousands of years later, God’s Spirit appeared to the early church as fire, to equip them to carry out His commission and His work.
We see a gradual progression here. First, God appeared as fire to Moses and told him to remove his sandals for “you are standing on holy ground” (Exodus 3:5). At that time, God appeared as fire to deliver his people. Then, God appeared as fire to His church and gave them of it, but just to their tongues. This hearkens back to Isaiah, who appeared before the throne of God and had his mouth sanctified by the burning coal from the altar. God’s intention for us as the church was to carry out His work with the portion of fire He gave us—our mouths—just like He gave Isaiah a consecrated mouth (Isaiah 6:6-8; Matt 24:14).
But God is not done with us yet. At some point, we will not only have mouths consecrated by fire, but our whole being. We will be fire, just as He is fire-- we are image bearers and our God is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29). That will be the only way to withstand His presence, that will be the only way we survive judgment. I do not know what this will look like and there is much of this I don’t fully understand, but I am sharing this with you out of obedience and praying for His Spirit to draw us together in right understanding.
Over and over we are told of “fire” throughout the Bible. Dig into your Bibles and read what God says about fire, especially how it was used in the Old Testament religious services, all of which were visual representations of spiritual realities. Every human being that has ever lived has a destiny with fire, and there are only two outcomes: you either become the fire, or you are destroyed by it.
(Exodus 3:2-5) There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in a blazing fire from within a bush. Moses saw the bush ablaze with fire, but it was not consumed. So Moses said, "I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up." When the LORD saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am.” "Do not come any closer," God said. "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground."
(Acts 2:1-4) When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like a mighty rushing wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw tongues like flames of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
(2 Peter 3:10,11) But the Day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar, the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and its works will be laid bare. Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to conduct yourselves in holiness and godliness.
(Isaiah 29:5,6) But your many foes will be like fine dust, the multitude of the ruthless like blowing chaff. Then suddenly, in an instant, from the LORD of hosts you will be punished with thunder and earthquake and loud noise, With whirlwind and tempest and the flame of a consuming fire.
No comments:
Post a Comment