I learned that Love is the purest expression of fire.
It's a new year, and quite frankly everything has changed. There is a hastening in the air. I feel like I've already changed twice since we crossed over. And the downloads are progressing quicker than ever..
January 14:
It always seemed to me like newcomers in the faith usually received something of a divine welcome present. Like the “thanks for coming” baggie you get for attending a church service for the first time. It’s full of goodies and you’re thinking if this is the stock this church is made of, perhaps you should visit again. In the newbie stage, everything you pray for happens so fast and you’re full of gratitude because you’re not even sure how you could possibly be counted into a love that showers incredible peace in truth, and also freely gives good gifts. We all got the welcome baggie. I can’t forget mine - it contained a stupendous career boost that made my head spin and my eyes roll. Well if you know this phenomenon, you know. And if you don’t know well, neither does anyone who thinks they know really.
It's a paradox.
And if anyone thinks that he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know.“
I Corinthians 8:2
My natural propensity for organized thoughts and design (writer syndrome) reflects in my faith walk and it seems like every season in my journey, every step, usually is part of a central theme. Each theme is like a building being laid brick by brick. I never really know where we're going but I always enjoy the journey. A clearer understanding of this “newbie phenomenon” is the latest stop in the present themed journey that I didn’t know I needed, but desperately did. I'll explain why. And the theme is Love.
We tend to experience God in phases: in the beginning of the relationship we are so aware of how little we have to do with the grace that saved us, and the Love that has swallowed us up and claimed us as his own. We are happy just to love and be loved. Every little vision, encounter, awareness of the Spirit is a gift like water refreshing parched and weary souls. Then somewhere in the middle of the journey, like a child growing up, we become more aware of ourselves. Spiritual exercises and the knowledge that comes with them intensify, and the more we do, the more we believe we have more and more to do with what Love does with us. We forget the reality of when we first believed. That everything - from each breath that is sent to us to the destiny laid out for us, and everything between - is from Love and for Love.
And thus is the Kingdom reserved for the heart of a child.
Mature believers seem to struggle more instead of the ease that is our covenant possession. Because like Jacob, we wrestle with the Lord as he wrestles our flawed understanding of him out of us. And it's ok to wrestle as long as we let him win in the end. But if he rewards the error-of-maturity that emphasizes labor for blessings, then every encounter within that understanding builds up to an idolatrous altar that we name in the name of the Lord and return to over and again. The result of this is something like I saw on tv the other day: someone in a church congregation recalled how a traditional spiritualist raised a man from the dead (allegedly) and another person asked “then why are we serving God if others can do that?” I wept. How often we believe we serve God only to be found serving self. This relationship is not a worship-for-gifts or praise-for-breakthrough transaction. It must be a love-for-love one. Everything God has done and will ever do for us is because of his passionate love for us, and everything we do for and with him must be born of love. As Jesus said, if you love me you will do what I say. We cannot walk with God outside love - not very well. We will waste time and spend strength sketching out the perfect plan to trigger an answer-by-fire instead of building upon and resting in the consciousness of what Love has already freely given backed with the wisdom to sustain.
The greatest and purest fire is Love itself, anyway. God entirely is love, and that Love is a consuming fire. There is no greater power.
“For everyone will be seasoned with fire, and every sacrifice will be seasoned with salt. Mark 9:49
Reborn of the stock of our Father, we too are now made of fire. It's like Ezekiel's visions of God as beautiful fearful multi-type fire; those closest in proximity radiating this fire inside and out. Proximity to fire demands the presence of fire. So also, if we really know God's Love, we will become love - have love and show love.
Like salt to a sacrifice, fire purifies us to preserve and to produce the incorruptible. So when life heats up, why should I be moved? It's only the perfect energy for something new and powerful in me to gain the energy required to escape the surface. The end result will always be the same: I shine.
So now I live with the confidence that there is nothing in the universe with the power to separate us from God’s love. I’m convinced that his love will triumph over death, life’s troubles, fallen angels, or dark rulers in the heavens. There is nothing in our present or future circumstances that can weaken his love. Romans 8:38
That verse sums up the nature and power of this Love that I am learning more of every day. It is not some cute and cuddly feeling, it is a consuming fire that rides the clouds to come to my aid and will level whatever contends with my peace.
It is not an inconsistent reality made available based on my worthiness - something wrestled out of me recently - it is a covenant by blood, a covenant of salt in spite of my unworthiness. It's not a fear of falling that keeps me standing, but Love constrains me. And evident in the power that saved me, it holds more than enough power to keep me saved.
It's not a fear of falling that keeps me standing, but Love constrains me.
As I heard it so brilliantly put “our confidence is not in our ability to hold on to Jesus, it’s in His ability to never let go of us”.
”My Father who sent me has determined that I will not lose even one of those he has given to me, and I will raise them up in the last day.“ John 6:39
Moreover, in the end, all our works will be passed through fire and only love will remain.
Grace-Grace.
What more could we desire than to become what we were made to be. We are of fire. We carry this fire. Now all who encounter us will encounter fire. 🔥
My heartbeat soared as I raced through these words... Unsung melodies float through the cracks of my vocal cords... If God became man, all on the coattails of an eternal love affair... If man became God, all by the brush strokes of an eternal sacrifice... Then my life is no longer my own; I am the lovechild borne out of fire... I am the God-kind made entirely out of love; It's all I am and will ever be...
I have been reborn of the stock of my Father; I too I am now made of fire...