Have you sat in front of a fireplace drinking in the wonder of dancing flames? Have you noticed the gradient colors of orange and white throbbing to be unleashed? How they send emissary sparks into new places while consuming twigs and logs! Fire changes matter from one form into another leaving evidence of what it was and never again will be.
If we live our fleshly natural life by the resurrection power of Jesus and grow into our new spiritual identity, we enter our eternal home even while now living in our earthly jar of clay!
“And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. And he looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, ‘I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.’ When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, ‘Moses, Moses!’ And he said. ‘Here I am.’ Then he said, ‘Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place you are standing is holy ground.’” -Exodus 3:2-5.
God appeared to Moses in a fire that did not consume a “burning” bush. It was at the beginning of the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness with the Children of Israel. Now Moses is sending Israel into the land they are to possess reminding them of who their God is!
“For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.” -Deuteronomy 4:24.
Joshua led Israel across the Jordan into their new land at Jericho and the walls came tumbling down. But years later, Israel still is not submitting to their kingdom God and we find them in Babylonian captivity. The Lord provides a vision to Ezekiel along the banks of the Chebal.
“As I looked, behold, a stormy wind came out of the north, and a great cloud, with brightness around it, and fire flashing forth continually, and in the midst of the fire, as it were gleaming metal. …” -Ezekiel 1:4cf.
God Himself, our creator, a living Person existing outside of our living space, and yet at the same time, in it! He is not confined to boundaries. He is a living Person choosing to bring naturally created people into His living eternality and into His fellowship through grace. It is impossible for God’s creation to know personally their creator God except under His terms and as He chooses to reveal Himself. This He has done through Jesus His Son, our Savior, by His agape love and grace, and by our faith.
Today, within God’s covenant of grace, God continues using fire to reveal His deity. At Pentecost all those in the upper room witnessed it.
“And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them.” - Acts 2:2-3.
Seeing the fire of God resting upon people was an extra-ordinary event and then they began speaking in languages they didn’t even know … but the many foreigners from out of town knew. The Holy Spirit of God had come in fire demonstrating deity, His presence, His power and love. Now, residing within human persons, just as Jesus had said, the Holy Spirit of God is teaching people through their faith, completing the work God left to be done in us who are in Him.
John the Baptist put it this way:
“I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with water and fire.” – Matthew 3:11.
This is our loving Father God, creator of mankind, declaring His deity to Moses. Now, under grace, He will baptize us with fire also. While the fire was once physical, showing God’s resurrection power and love toward mankind, now this same outside divine physical fire is within each and every believer, in the Person of the Holy Spirit. It is revealing the glory and righteous power of our resurrected Jesus within us who accept His agape love and sanctification.
God has moved us from knowing what God is like through external evidence and signs to knowing God intimately within our own jar of clay where God begins changing who we were in flesh into who He Spiritually is! We are joined, His Spirit with our spirit, to bring His holiness into our understanding through His grace and into our physical earthly reality.
It is God’s cleansing fire operating through the Holy Spirit because of our faith in Him. This is the New Covenant, where believers become members of His Body to sit and rule with Him.
What we now do in our body will be the product of who we are in Him! As we choose to submit to God’s fire we will begin producing works built upon our new foundation of Jesus Christ our Lord. Paul tells us, “Now if anyone builds upon the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw – each one’s work will be manifest, for the day will disclose it. Because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work shall be burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.”
– 1Corinthians 3:12-15.
We must make wise Spiritual choices requiring us to have Spiritual knowledge. We need to understand our Spiritual make-up and grow God’s seed of life within us rather than gratifying the desires of our fleshly carnality.
There is a constant process in the life of the believer to nurture the life God is providing while at the same time putting to death those things separating us from God’s holy righteousness.
The Old Testament offerings were symbols of the deaths we must experience in Christ as we share His sufferings and sacrifice. The sin in our flesh no longer controls who we are because we are now in Christ Jesus. We can allow the holy fire of Jesus to purify us, changing from one degree of glory to the next or we can suffer loss through self-choices.
We are already made righteous (Justified) in Christ Jesus. We have moved from the law and now stand in God’s kingdom of grace. The law of the Spirit of Christ has set us free from the law of the flesh. We no longer are ruled by sin when God’s Spirit is living within us. We can now allow God’s fire of truth purge us within on our Trail of Faith in Christ Jesus, making us complete when we see Him face to face.
Our mortal life is our sacrifice to God in Christ Jesus. The process of putting to death the deeds of the flesh creates an offering well pleasing to God. Paul describes this human struggle in Corinthians:
“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh.” – 2Corinthians 4:8-11.
We have within us the resurrection power of Jesus Christ.
“For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance of life to life.” always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh.” – 2Corinthians 2:15-16.
Paul expressed it this way to the saints at Philippi:
“For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh … But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith – that I might know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” – Philippians 3:3-11.
Fire is one of many pictures God has used to instruct you and me about “the righteousness from God that depends upon faith” in our relationship of grace in Jesus our Savior.
If we live our fleshly natural life by the resurrection power of Jesus and grow into our new spiritual glory, we enter our eternal home even while still living in our earthly jar of clay!