Consecration: Baptism of Love and Fire

All of the foundations that God has been laying in our hearts over the last three months, with the word about the bride of Christ and what God wants for the church, have led to this. Being a point of understanding the Father’s heart for His church right now, and what I see happening all around me. That is, God wants a baptism of love and fire for His church. And He is having it. In reality, those two aspects of God are the same thing, love and fire, and that’s something we need to unpack.

And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.

(John 1:14, NASB95)

As John reveals the deity of Christ and His glory in John chapter 1, he makes a powerful statement in verse 14, that when Jesus came to the earth in His glory, He came full of grace and full of truth. These two characteristics of God and of His Son are a fundamental struggle for our understanding in the flesh. In our own desires, we always want to experience Jesus either full of grace or full of truth, but we can’t comprehend being full of both at the same time. This touches many other messages we’ve already shared, as well as those shared by the church in Houston (www.thewellhouston.life) during the same time period, as God has been bringing this theme to us over and over again.

In particular circumstances in our own lives, or in certain parts of scripture, we often experience what we perceive as God’s grace and love and patience and mercy and kindness, and the list goes on and on. These are wonderful and very real things. We’ll call them God’s softer side, or some would say “the God of the New Testament”, but those are both our own misperceptions of God. In other circumstances or scriptures, we experience what we perceive as God’s truth and justice and holiness and judgment and fire and discipline and correction and authority as the sovereign King. We could call that God’s harder side or the “God of the Old Testament”, but again, those would be our own misperceptions of very real things.

Many, many scriptures reveal that God is not flip-flopping back and forth between these two seemingly opposite characters. God does not change. We must believe all of Him. And we must not give up on believing in God because His nature is different than ours or because His ways are higher than ours. We must change in order to understand Him more fully, not vice versa.

He is full of grace and full of truth and never compromises one for the other. God does not “balance” grace and truth; that is how we often try to resolve the concept in our minds. A balance would indicate pulling back from one side so you could more fully have the other. That is not God’s way. He is fully God all the time in all grace and in all truth, and that was perfectly “explained” (John 1:18) in His Son, Jesus Christ. We often come to God and to Jesus with a worldly view of fairness and right and wrong, but when our starting place is our own viewpoint or the philosophies of the world, we will always struggle to perceive the full nature of God. He is utterly beyond us, yet has made Himself knowable in Christ.

For the choir director; for flute accompaniment. A Psalm of David.

1 Give ear to my words, O Lord,

Consider my groaning.

2 Heed the sound of my cry for help, my King and my God,

For to You I pray.

3 In the morning, O Lord, You will hear my voice;

In the morning I will order my prayer to You and eagerly watch.

4 For You are not a God who takes pleasure in wickedness;

No evil dwells with You.

5 The boastful shall not stand before Your eyes;

You hate all who do iniquity.

6 You destroy those who speak falsehood;

The Lord abhors the man of bloodshed and deceit.

7 But as for me, by Your abundant lovingkindness I will enter Your house,

At Your holy temple I will bow in reverence for You.

8 O Lord, lead me in Your righteousness because of my foes;

Make Your way straight before me.

9 There is nothing reliable in what they say;

Their inward part is destruction itself.

Their throat is an open grave;

They flatter with their tongue.

10 Hold them guilty, O God;

By their own devices let them fall!

In the multitude of their transgressions thrust them out,

For they are rebellious against You.

11 But let all who take refuge in You be glad,

Let them ever sing for joy;

And may You shelter them,

That those who love Your name may exult in You.

12 For it is You who blesses the righteous man, O Lord,

You surround him with favor as with a shield.

(Psalm 5)

David understood the fullness of grace and truth. He was God’s great poet-warrior. David could cry out to God in longing and contemplate His holiness, that no evil could dwell with Him, and yet enter God’s house only by His “abundant lovingkindness” (hesed, loyal love). David had no problem with the love, holiness, mercy, judgment, worship, justice and refuge of God. But do we believe in all of who God is? Do we believe God would shake things we hold on to?

26 And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heaven.” 27 This expression, “Yet once more,” denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. 28 Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; 29 for our God is a consuming fire.

(Hebrews 12:26-29)

In a previous message, “Foundations for the Bride: The Father’s Love”, we looked at Hebrews 12:4-11 and other passages showing how God’s love as a Father includes discipline and training of His children. With that in mind, the author of Hebrews moves in this chapter from the Father training His children right into how God deals with His kingdom, by shaking off worldly things and by consuming fire.

“I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!

(Luke 12:49)

13 and in the middle of the lampstands I saw one like a son of man, clothed in a robe reaching to the feet, and girded across His chest with a golden sash. 14 His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire.

(Revelation 1:13-14)

2 “But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. 3 He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, so that they may present to the Lord offerings in righteousness. 4 Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.

(Malachi 3:2-4)

These scriptures point to a climactic day of the Lord in the future when Jesus will burn away all that is not of God’s kingdom. However, they also indicate the burning and shaking of the kingdom of God that is happening now. God is shaking His church. He desires a baptism of love and fire, and He is having it. God is having a consecration (Romans 12:1) that purifies His people and brings them fully to Him. God will not be known falsely. He is all love and truth and all grace and fire and all Father.

As Hebrews 12:26-29 describes, as God shakes things and burns and purifies things in your life, cling to Him and to the kingdom which cannot be shaken, and through this consecration, as you are separated from the world and unto Him, you will find yourself in a position to offer a pleasing and acceptable service, a living sacrifice to Him. But we must let Him shine His light. We must let the fire burn so that the things of this world that are not of the kingdom of God will fall off.

To the degree we struggle with God and misunderstand His ways, the answer is always repentance. By the blood of Jesus Christ, the only way we can stand in the fire of His eyes gazing on us is by clinging to His blood in the act of repentance. The act of “Go. From now on sin no more.” (John 8:11). This is the only way. We cannot justify ourselves, and we have to stop trying. Let His blood wash over us, and His fire burn within us until nothing of ourselves is left except the eternal. Invite His fire and be prepared to let go of all that will be burned, and He will see you through. As John saw Jesus with eyes of fire in all His glory in Revelation 1, John fell down before this terrifying glory. But Jesus, full of grace and truth, eyes full of fire, reached out to John.

17 When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. And He placed His right hand on me, saying, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, 18 and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.

(Revelation 1:17-18)

Do not be afraid of the fire. Jesus will see you through. He has already overcome the enemy. Let God have all the fruit that He desires in your life. Let God have what He wants in you and in us and in the church. Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.