FIRE...

Holding a metal stick with hot dogs above the log being consumed by the fire we had set, I sat back and realize just how beautiful fire is.  The orange, blue, yellow, white colors that dance over, under and around the logs.  The magnificence of the heat permeating from the fire, enough to cook hot dogs and marshmallows and make me considerably warm sitting a few feet away.  I watched large, formidable logs be turned from a solid, to dust.  I watched as the fire transformed these logs.  First they transformed to a black, charcoal then from that, into the fine white dust of ash, that can be blown around.  Ash is amazing too.  Ash makes great fertilizer and creates a lush and healthy garden. 

You don’t have to think too hard about how it relates to your life when you sit in front of a fire.  Lets pretend that we are the logs and the Holy Spirit is the flame.  Our lives are a tree first.  We grow and then are cut down.  We are cut down either due to infection or due to need for space.  We are no longer a living organism.  When man was with God, traveling with God in the garden of Eden, we were a living organism.  Then sin creeped in and we were taken away from the life source.  The water, the nourishment, now, sitting on the side, we could sit there and rot, being infested by bugs and sin and being eaten from the inside out, or we could use or life for something amazing.  We could become a source of warmth, food and beauty for many. 

So we are in the wood pile for the fire, and we are the log chosen for the fire.  We get put on and start to get warm, start to crackle a little, it isn’t necessarily the most pain free process, but it is amazing feeling all the bugs and the sin scurry out of us to run from the heat.  Then God starts to use us.  He uses us for heat, to heat those around us, to feed those around us, to keep the fire going.  He uses us to fuel the flame that has been going.  We just have to decide if we are going to stick in the fire or run away screaming.  Fire is used to refine people and metal.  Fire is used to burn crops and even when uncontrolled can be beneficial to the forests. 

My grandma’s house was burnt down by a fire, but it was a blessing in disguise because the house was being eaten by termites, even though she had it treated every year, and the main support beams were so weak that the house may have collapsed on her within the month. 

The Bible says in Hebrews 12:29 “for our God is a consuming Fire.” 

Lets let Him consume our life, let him come in and transform our life to something amazing.  Lets not throw water on the fire during the transformation and halt it and let sin come back in, lets let him consume our life.  Lets let those around us become on fire for God.  Can you imagine what the world would be like if people were actually on fire for Christ?