Scripture Focus…
Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly.
(Exodus 19:18)
John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”
(Luke 3:16)
Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”
(Matthew 25:41)
And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them.
(Acts 2:3)
Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.
(Hebrews 12:28-29)
So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!
(James 3:5)
And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night.
(Exodus 13:21)
Shared…
The following was spoken over 2018 by Brother Kenneth Copeland:
“2018 is the Year of the Holy Ghost and fire. The BIG EIGHTEEN for 2018. The nine fruits of the Spirit and the nine gifts of the Spirit. That time is not just coming, it’s already here. But, as His sons and daughters, we’re going to have spiritual explosions going on throughout 2018—particularly in the areas of holiness and cleansing.”
The following excerpt is taken from Ablaze for God by Wesley L. Duewel:
The Holy Spirit Will Set You Ablaze
An important symbolical message for us in the fire of the Spirit is undoubtedly His work of purifying. This is the central reality in the experience of being filled with the Spirit (Acts15:9). However, there are other significant truths taught by the fire-symbol of the Spirit. Let us look at these.
John the Baptist had prophesied of Jesus that “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire” (Matthew 3:11; Luke 3:16). The coming of the Spirit is to have the effect of fire. Christ desired that all the fiery ministry of the Spirit be active in the life of His own. He kindled the holy flame of God in the hearts of His followers as He began His earthly ministry.
Jesus had said, “I have come to bring fire on the earth” (Luke 12:49).
Zeal for accomplishing God the Father’s purpose was burning in Jesus like an unquenchable fire. He had a “burning readiness to do all the Father’s will, even though it cost Him His blood.” Our flaming-hearted Savior should have disciples with hearts similarly aflame.
“We must not be insipid. There is not a dull page in all this age-long story of the redeeming of the race.”
Quayle pleads with us not to be apathetic but to be vigilant.
Benjamin Franklin confessed that he often went to hear George Whitefield because he could watch him burn before his very eyes. We have forgotten the root meaning from which we get our word “enthusiastic.” It is from en theos, i.e., in God. When God gets His flaming Spirit into our personalities He naturally burns within us with holy dynamic. We become ablaze and we set others ablaze.
God said to Jeremiah, “I will make my words in your mouth a fire.” (Jeremiah 5:14). On that occasion God was referring to fire as a judgment. But God similarly makes our words fiery in order that His people may become aflame with holy love, zeal, and obedience.
When the Holy Spirit sets our heart aflame He will cause our words to be aflame. When our personality is aflame with commitment to Christ and with a burning vision of what He purposes to do for us, our whole leadership comes alive with life and becomes vibrant with power.
He sets you aflame with His fiery baptism. “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire,” said John the Baptist of Jesus (Matthew 3:11; Luke 3:16). This refers to “the fiery character of the Spirit’s operations upon the soul-searching, consuming, refining, sublimating—as nearly all good interpreters understand the words.” The inner fire of the Spirit sets the Spirit-filled person ablaze with His divine presence.
He empowers you with His fiery divine energy. The fire of God speaks also of His divine energy constantly ready to empower His own who are totally surrendered to Him. Christ desires that all fiery ministry of the Spirit be active in your life. “I have come to bring fire on the earth” (Luke 12:49). He kindled the holy flame of God in the hearts of His followers as He began His earthly ministry. But He knew they needed more of the Spirit.
On the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit visibly descended in holy flame upon the men and women gathered in the Upper Room. Empowered by the Spirit, they began to spread God’s holy fire that very day. For decades the Spirit’s fire kept burning and spreading. Persecution could not quench their fire, it only served to fan the flames. Pentecost lit a flame that by God’s grace will never go out.
He sets you aglow with His fiery radiance and zeal. Romans 12:11 urges, “Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor.” You have spiritual zeal when you are spiritually ablaze. Weymouth translates this, “Have your spirits aglow”; Godspeed, “on fire with the Spirit”; and the Revised Standard Version states it, “Be aglow with the Spirit.”
The Holy Spirit revives your spirit, fills you with abundance of life, love, and zeal, and sets you aglow so that you manifest the vibrant, radiant life of God. He will revive your devotion, accelerate your obedience, and fan into flame your zeal. As a Spirit-filled believer you should be marked by the intense devotion, eager earnestness, and the loyal bond-service which characterizes the heavenly angels. Apollos (Acts 18:25) was thus ablaze. The literal translation can be that he was “burning in spirit,” or “glowing with the Spirit.”
When the Spirit burns within you in freedom and fullness, your inner life becomes radiant, your zeal intense, and your service dynamic. You, in the words of Ephesians 5:16, are “making the most of every opportunity.”
He provides you gifts which you are to stir into flame. Spiritual gifts are endowments for service given through the activity of the Holy Spirit. God provides whatever divine enablements we need for the service to which He appoints us. The Holy Spirit Himself is God’s great gift to us (Acts 2:38) but He bestows grace-gifts (charismata) providing divine endowment and enablement for serving God and the body of Christ.
“Fan into flame the gift of God which is in you,” Paul urged Timothy (2 Timothy 1:6). Notice the gift was “in” him. The Holy Spirit primarily works from within, not upon in some external sense. He does not manipulate us, He enables by His indwelling presence and power.
God never appoints or guides you to do a service without being available to endow and empower you with all you need to do His will. But there is a cooperating role for you to play. You must kindle anew, or fan into full flame the divine endowment. God’s gifts are given to be cherished and used. To fail to use them as God desires is to fail God and people. We develop them by use. As we use God’s endowment, the Spirit enables us, guides us, and makes us fruitful.
The constant tendency of fire is to go out. The Spirit does not waste divine energy. If we do not obey and use the grace God provides, He ceases to bestow. The Greek tense of the verb emphasized the continuous rekindling of the flame. The spiritual biography of many a Christian leader is “once ablaze.” Was there a time when you were more ablaze for God than you are today?
Praise God, a flickering flame that is almost gone can be fanned into brilliant fire again. That fanning must be a continuous process. Five times in Leviticus 6 God instructed that the fire on the altar of burnt offering was never to go out. He had initially given that fire from heaven (Leviticus 9:24; 2 Chronicles 7:11). God supplies the fire, but we must keep it burning. We constantly need the Spirit’s fire, symbolizing the divine presence within us, and we constantly need the touch of God’s grace provided through the atonement upon us. Out consecration to God should never lapse and His presence and power in and upon us should never diminish.
God has created out spirits flammable. We are spiritually combustible. Our nature is created to be set ablaze by the Spirit. We are spiritually most blessed, most victorious, most usable when we are ablaze. We are most Godlike when we glow with holy flame—the flame of the indwelling Spirit.
The fire of God gives an unforgettable attraction to the personality of God’s messenger and to the content of his message. It imparts a sacred authority that cannot be counterfeited by human efforts. It so seals with the mark of God that others are unable to ignore it. It gives a holy authenticity and assures of integrity. It impresses with the obvious involvement and partnership of God.
Whatever the cost, we must keep the flame of the Spirit burning on the altar of our hearts. The Greek word in “fan into flame” in 2 Timothy 1:6 refers to the use of a bellows to cause a smoldering fire to flame up. This takes effort. Timothy was to do all in his power to intensify the manifestation of the flame of the Spirit. Our cooperation with the Spirit is essential to consistency of flowing ardor, spiritual radiance, and flaming zeal.
Wanted: A Burning Heart!
Our communities are little impressed by our programs and manifold activities. It takes more than a busy church, a friendly church, or even an evangelical church to impact a community for Christ. It must be a church ablaze, led by leaders who are ablaze for God.
Prayed…
Father, thank You for Your mercy and for Your grace
Thank You for the freedom to come together in the realm of prayer
We come together to stir one another up and to fan the flame, Father
You have given each and every one of us a fire to do Your will and Your plan
Yes, Father You have given us the same spirit that Your Son Jesus had!
No, You did not leave us alone, or forsake us, but You gave us the Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit who reveals, discloses and transmits the things of the Father to us
We need that fire, we need to be set ablaze so that the world would see and know You!
This is the great commission, to go into all the world, to preach the gospel!
There is so much hurt, and need, and we want to be Your hands and Your feet, Father
Declaring that 2018 would be the year of Holy Ghost and fire!
Infuse us with the very life and fire of God!
That fire is breaking through in a new and in a fresh way
Calling for a shift to take place in the spirit today!
We will see and seize every opportunity You have for us, Father
Shake that up and shake that out!
Away with the status quo, away with the status quo
We will break those barriers and those boundaries
The wind of the Holy Spirit is blowing through, and the wind is blowing you!
Illuminate those things to us, Father
We rebuke complacency, we rebuke indifference, get out of the church of the living God!
You have called us into Your kingdom for such a time as this
Tongues of fire in the church, Lord!
There is a showing, there is a revealing, and there is a disclosing
A new fire, a white hot fire, a fresh fire from heaven!
Calling forth a shaking in the church!
Praying for the fire of the Holy Spirit to burn brighter than it has ever burned before!
By the power of the precious Holy Spirit we call for the momentum to change!
Those things will be rearranged according to Your word, Father
Calling for those doors that need to be opened, to be open in Jesus’ name!
Declaring for Holy Spirit influence in the Oval Office, Lord!
We fan the flame of the all-consuming fire from heaven today!
Holy Spirit blow in this place!
Declaring for nothing to be missing and nothing broken in the body of Chris
