Lesson 6: Holy Fire Within

- Hey everybody, this is the final lesson, lesson six. It's so hard to believe it's been so... Well, I shouldn't say fun, it's been very enlightening and it's been very strengthening. I think that might describe it the most. I mean, when you're talking about the chastening of the Lord, it's not an easy subject and we're talking about enduring truth. Remember, the reason people are gonna be deceived in the last days, 2 Thessalonians tells us because they didn't receive the love of the truth. It didn't say because they wouldn't receive the truth. It said they didn't receive the love of truth. It's one thing to hear truth, it's another thing to love truth. I wanna remind you again, I'm preaching out of this book, A Heart of Blaze. Now, this book is far too long to cover exhaustively. There is so much in this book that I have not talked about. You can get this book by going to Amazon, you can get this book by going to johnbevere.com. I don't care how you get it. So just wanna let you know so you can get ahold of the message if you're interested. Now, let's talk about this lesson. The title of it is Holy Fire Within. Okay, I wanna make this statement. All of God's children have needed correction at one time or another. Here's the question.

What will we do with God's correction, his chasing or his discipline? Will we resist it or will we embrace it? All right, pride, listen to me carefully, keeps us from receiving God's chastening. And we forfeit the benefit of his work of making us more like Jesus, his work of holiness. If we humble ourselves and receive his correction, we tenderize our hearts and position ourselves to hear from God with greater clarity. If you look at the prophet Habakkuk, he says in chapter two, verse one, I will stand my watch and set myself on the rampart and watch to see. Notice he doesn't say, listen and hear. He says, and watch to see what the Lord will say to me and what I will answer when I am corrected. The prophets walk closely with God, understood the importance of divine discipline correction, even rebuke. That's why Habakkuk was like, I'm gonna be alert to see what he is saying when he corrects me. And so Isaiah was another one, another one of the prophets who understood the value of God's chastening, his correction, his rebuke. We read in Isaiah chapter six, verse one, this is some of my favorite verses in the whole Old Testament. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord. Sitting on the throne high and lifted up and the train of his road filled the temple.

Now, I just wanna make this really, really clear. Isaiah saw the Lord. We're not talking about Abraham seeing God by the tear of the trees, not in his glory. Isaiah sees the Lord in his glory. So obviously, he's not in his physical body 'cause no man can look at God and live in his physical body. So God, the year was 740 BC, all right? God transports this priest, he was a priest at that time, transports him out of his body and plops him right down before the throne of God. And the first thing Isaiah notices other than the Lord are these massive angels called Sarah Finn, all right? Now, John, when he writes the book of Revelation, he calls him four living creatures, but there's four of these serifents. And the Bible says that one is crying to the other, holy, holy, holy. Now, they're not singing a song. I know there's a hymn, holy, holy, holy, Lord. Hey, they're not singing a hymn making God feel good about himself. They're responding to what they see. Every moment, a facet of his glory is revealed and one cries to the other three, holy. Now, I know it's this holy three times, but it's actually a Hebrew form of writing. Whenever they wanna emphasize a word, they write the word two times in succession. Jesus said, "Now everybody says to me,

Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom." If you're Matthew and you're sitting there, you go, "Wow, he really emphasized the word, Lord." You know, Jesus would've said something like this, not everybody who says to me, "Lord, he's gonna enter the kingdom." So he writes it twice. You'll see this all over the Bible. We, in English, we highlight the word, we italicize the word, we underline the word. They would write it twice. Very few times in scripture, it does a Hebrew writer write a word three times in succession. To do that, you have elevated the word to its highest degree of emphasis. You can't emphasize it anymore, okay? One example would be in the, and it only happens like five, six times in the Bible, in the book of Revelation, the angels are flying through the heavens and they cry out, "Whoa, whoa, whoa," that are gonna be poured out. Now, these angels are not like Fonzi's angels. Now, everybody over 15 knows what I'm talking about. There was this program called Happy Days and this guy named Fonzi who's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Okay, they're not doing that. They are crying, whoa, so loud. They're probably shaking the entire solar system. And so John the Apostle writes it three times.

The only time you're gonna find anything about God written three times in succession in the entire Bible is Isaiah 6 and Revelation 4. That is when Isaiah sees the seraphine who John calls for living creatures and both of them have it and they're crying out, holy, holy, holy. In other words, they're crying, holy, so loud. Their shouts, their cries are shaking an arena in heaven. Listen to me, an arena in heaven. It seats over a billion beings to its foundations. That's exactly what it says. It says, their voices shook, I'm reading verse four, their voices shook the temple to its foundations and the entire building was filled with smoke. I mean, these guys are responding every moment. Another facet of God's glory is revealed and one cries the other holy and they're shaking the whole arena. I mean, they're not like saying, oh, God, I've been doing this for 10 trillion years. Think you could bring in some replacements on. I'm getting a little board of doing this. Are you kidding? They don't want to be anywhere else. There is nothing in all the creation, more beautiful than the creator, him, self. So now, I think what's interesting is they're not crying faithful, faithful, faithful. Is God faithful?

Yes, you better believe he's faithful. You can go to the bank on his faithfulness, but that's not his attribute that stands out. They're not crying, love, love, love, is God, love. Yes, God doesn't have love. He is love, but yet that's not his attribute that stands above all others. They're crying, holy, holy, holy. And you know what's interesting? The only description of the church that Jesus is coming back for, the bride is a holy bride without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. In other words, she's unspotted from the world. Isn't that interesting? The predominant characteristic of God is holy. The description of the church. The bride he's come back for is holy. I think we need to pay attention to this word, holiness. Now, I'm going to keep reading. Above it's the seraphon, each one had six wings, with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew, and one cried to another, and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is filled with his glory. Their voices shook the temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke. Verse five, when Isaiah sees the Lord, he doesn't go, "Hey God, it's me, I'm your priest. "You're soon to be prophet, Isaiah, I'm here." Uh-uh, are you kidding?

Isaiah, when he sees the Lord, cries out, "Woe is me, for I am undone." Stop right there. Woe is the highest form of judgment, a person can pronounce on a group of people, or a person in the Bible, all right? Now, if you look at Isaiah, he's a godly preacher. If you look at Isaiah five, he says, "Woe to the drunkard, woe to those who call evil, "good and good evil, woe to the proud, "woe to those who linger long at the bottle." But he comes to Isaiah six, he has one glimpse of God, it's no longer as woe is the center, it's woe is me. For the first time in Isaiah's life, he realizes who this really is he's serving, who this holy God is he's serving. And for the first time in his life, he realizes who I am before this holy God. I mean, if you look at Job, it was the same way. Job was the most godly man on the planet. God himself said it. I mean, this is not the most godly man in the community, the most godly man on planet earth. And yet, he says, "And Job, I have heard you "by the hearing of the ear, my eyes seized you, Lord. "Now I abhor myself." For the first time in his life, Job realized who it was he was serving. Remember Moses, most godly man in all of Israel? He sees the glory of God, and he was trembling with fear.

Remember John the Apostle? He sees the resurrected Jesus in all of his glory. He falls down like a dead man. See, this is why this is so important to talk about. We've got to understand the glory of the one that we are serving. So, Isaiah says, "Woe is me, for I am undone." The word undone there means, I'm literally coming apart at the seams. Because I am a man of unclean lips. He immediately recognizes the sin that needs to get out of his life. And then he says, "And I dwell in the midst "of people with unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the king." In other words, I've seen his holiness, and now I compare it to me and the people I dwell with, "Oh my gosh, do they need to repent?" Now, it's so important that we get this. He's on the foregravelling, he's repenting, and what happens next? "Then one of the seraphant flew to me, "having in his hand a live coal, "which he had taken with the tongues from the altar, "and he touched my mouth and said, 'Behold, "this has touched your lips, your iniquity has taken away, "and your sin is purged.'" There was a cleansing. Verse 8, "Also, I heard the voice of the Lord saying, 'Who shall I send, and who will go for us?' Then I said, 'Here I am, Lord.'"

Now, you've got to understand what God speaks, it's like rain falling down to the earth. Okay? Remember, he said, "Your word is like what? The rains that come down from heaven." If you think about it right now, there are satellite waves that are coming into right where you're sitting. No matter where you are, there are satellite waves coming down, and you have to have the right receiver to be able to receive those pictures or words from those satellites. Well, it's the same thing with the word of God. God's word is like rain, it comes down on the earth. And you know what's interesting? God speaks, anybody in Israel could have heard what he said, but only one man could hear. The man that was cleansed by humbling himself. And so Isaiah cried out, "Here I am, Lord, send me." To everybody else in Israel, this is what was going on. And God said, "Go and tell this people, keep on hearing, but do not understand. Keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and shut their eyes lest they see with their eyes. They hear with their ears and understand with their heart, and in turn, I heal them." Nobody else could hear because their ears were dull, their eyes were blind, their heart was dull, they couldn't hear the voice of God. Isaiah was the only person. I mean, I'm thinking about this a few years ago, and I was in prayer because I love the Scripture so much. And I remember that particular morning, I'd read these verses in Isaiah, and I remember I was out in the midst of trees walking and praying, and I said, "God, this is what I need. I need a fresh vision of Jesus. This is something I so need in my life, so I can go from glory to glory, from faith

to faith. I need a fresh vision of Jesus." And I start crying out for a fresh vision of Jesus, and the Holy Spirit spoke to me, and He said, "Son, that's not how I started the verse." And I was a bit baffled. I thought, "What?" He said, "That's not how I started the verse." And I remember I had to run back in, get my Bible, open up to Isaiah 6, and this is what I read. In the year the king, Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, and the Holy Spirit said, "Stop." He said, "Uzziah has to die before Isaiah can see a fresh vision of me." I said, "Who's Uzziah?" I knew he was one of the kings, but I didn't know if he was the king of Israel or Judah. Well, I found him in 2 Chronicles 26, and I found out this is a young man who's 16 years old, his dad, Amaziah dies, and all the people of Judah, he's the king of Judah, all the people of Judah take this 16-year-old young man and make him king instead of his father, Amaziah. He's in 2 Chronicles 26, verse 4, and he did what was right in the sight of the Lord. So we're talking about a good king, he's not a bad king, he's a good king. He did what was right in the sight of the Lord according to all his father, Amaziah had done. He saw God in the days of Zechariah, who had understanding in the visions of God. Now listen to this statement, "As long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper." Oh my gosh, there's so much in that, all right? He seeks the Lord and God makes him prosper. It's not as long as he sought the benefit of his people or the good of his nation, the success of his ministry, but as long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper. Now you talk about prosper, wow. This guy, he unplugs the wells that the Philistines had filled, he then causes agriculture to boom in his country.

And agriculture booms, the economy booms back in those days, then he strengthened his military and he started taking back cities that his fathers, his king fathers, had lost through their disobedience. And Zechariah basically restores Judah back to the glory almost, almost, not all the way, almost that it had in the days of Solomon. I mean, this guy got what we like to call in the United States the Midas Touch, everything he touched turned to gold. And we read that his fame spread far and wide because he was marvelously helped by the Lord. That's verse 15. But then we come to verse 16 and it says, "But when he was strong, his heart was lifted up." What is that? Pride. To his destruction, for he transgressed against the Lord his God by entering the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. So as Ariah and eighty valiant priests come into the temple and they boldly confront the king and say, "It is not for you, King Uzziah, to burn incense, but the priests, the sons of Aaron, you have trespassed against God. Get out of this sanctuary. You'll have no honor from the Lord." Well, you know what happens? Who Ziah becomes furious with the priest. And the moment he gets angry at him, this is what proud people do. The moment he gets angry with the priest, leprosy breaks out on his forehead. Oh my gosh, so the priest's rush in, grab him, bring him out, and he literally has to live in an isolated house until he passes away, and the rest of his reign was spent isolated. Now, here's the thing we gotta talk about.

When pride introduced Isaiah's heart, the Holy Spirit asked me to squash it. When pride introduced Isaiah's heart, did he become more spiritual or less spiritual? I want you to answer it out loud. When pride enters his heart, does he become more spiritual or less spiritual? Some of you might be saying less spiritual, that is the wrong answer. He became more spiritual. He entered the temple to worship. A spirit of pride and a spirit of religion run hand in hand and they strengthen each other by covering each other up. Pride keeps you from admitting that you become religious and religion covers up your pride with your spiritual behavior. So in other words, it's a terrible, terrible, forceful, twins that run together, pride and religious behavior, or spiritually behaving in a way that you think you're being godly when in reality, you're not, you're actually going against God. So, when does pride enter Isaiah's heart when he becomes successful? Because here's what happens, he starts seeking God. He's 16 years old, he's made king of 3 million people. And now, actually, he was about over a million people. He starts seeking the Lord, he gets that might as touch, he gets that momentum, but then this is where momentum becomes dangerous. All of a sudden, now you stop doing

what created the momentum, the seeking God, as long as he sought the Lord, God made him prosper, and you still see success. In other words, everything he's touched and still turned into gold. So now, what started that momentum in the first place is no longer there. Now, pride can easily enter into his heart. And I want to talk about this. I want you to stop and think about what the people of Jerusalem and Judah said the day that they heard the news that their king got leprosy. Oh, this is terrible. We've had the best king since Solomon, and he's got leprosy, this is horrible. I mean, Instagram was blowing up. It was all over Facebook. It was all over YouTube. YouTube was doing programs on it. How could this have happened? Our king has gotten leprosy. This is horrible, but God gave us the inside story. See, the people didn't have the inside story. They saw, all they saw was leprosy. They saw the outward manifestation of his disobedience, of his pride. We know it was pride. Now, I was praying about this. At the time, I was praying about this, there were several leaders that had fallen.

They had committed immorality with their assistance. They had gotten into substance abuse. They had to step down from ministry. And God spoke to me so clearly, and he said, son, what you see is the affair with their assistant, the substance abuse. He said, but the root of it is pride. He said, the substance abuse, that's the leprosy. The affair with the assistant, that's the leprosy. It all began when they stopped seeking the Lord, and pride entered their heart. That's the root of it. So what God was saying to me, in the year that King Uzai died, I saw the Lord. He said, son, pride must die for you to have a fresh vision of me. And this is what else he spoke to my heart. He said, to the degree that pride dies is the degree that you're going to see me. And that changed my life forever. So if we revert back and we go back to this church in revelations, we look at the Laodicean church. Jesus makes this statement, as many as I love, I rebuke and chaste, and let me tell you some, God was sending somebody to Uzai to bring correction. It was Azariah and the 80 priests, remember the steps? Number one, God will attempt to get your attention through his word while Uzai has stopped seeking the Lord. So he's obviously not reading the word. So God sends somebody to him, Uzai Azariah.

But unfortunately, because he didn't listen to the person who was speaking to him, Azariah and the priests, but got angry with him. Third thing was leprosy, okay? For this reason, many are weak, sick, and die prematurely, okay? Are you seeing this is the outward thing of an inward pride? So here, Jesus says to this Laodicean church, as many as I love, I rebuke and I chaste them. Therefore, again, same words as we saw before in Hebrews, therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door. Now listen to this. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come and I will dine with him and he with me. Now, there's so much here. If you look at Jesus confronting this church, Number two, he said, put on white garments, that's your service to God. And number three, get eyesabbed so that you can see. Well, if you look at Isaiah, the same thing happened. When he saw the Lord, he hobbled himself and received God's correction, the refining member. He took the tongue, the cole from the altars and cleansed my lips. Number two, he became passionate for the holy work of God. He said, here I am, send me, that's the garments. And then God removed his veil.

Spiritual blindness through his humility. He could see as God was seeing. He was no longer, it was his heart dull, as the people's hearts were dull. No longer was he blind, as the people's hearts were blind in his generation. No longer could he not hear, as the people couldn't hear in his generation. He now was cleansed and ready to go. We'll listen to what Jesus says to this church. "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. "If anyone hears my voice." If anyone hears my voice. If anyone hears my voice, all right, and opens. I will come and dine with him and he with me. He's not talking about having a tuna sandwich for lunch together. He's talking about, I will give him my word, all right? Notice Jesus said, if anyone hears my voice, all right? So what do we see here again? The importance of hearing his voice. He's speaking to a church. And what does it mean to open the door? That means there's no more secrets. We're not hiding things from him. Remember, he said, there's nothing hidden that will not be revealed. There's nothing in secret that will not be shouted from the housetops. Let me tell you something.

You really wise when you don't hide things from God. This is so important. Have a life that is lived like an open book. It's so important. Only the humble can do this. So now, Jesus makes the statement. It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds, not preceded proceeds from the mouth of God. Jesus is saying, if you hear my voice, which remember, you got to go through cleansing in order to hear, just like Isaiah. He said, if you hear my voice and open up your heart, in other words, you don't keep things closed and locked away anymore, I will come in and feed you. Feed you with spiritual nourishment that will cause us to grow. Remember, Peter said, as newborn babes desires sit and seer milk of the word of God that you may grow there by. Let me tell you something. We experience intimacy with God when we go to the mountain. We are called to burn with the fire of God's glory, as Moses did, as Isaiah did, as Jeremiah, as John, as Paul, and others were. God's desire has and always been to inhabit his people, not just to visit us, but this won't happen unless we first separate ourselves from the world in its ways, and second, we're open to his correction. Remember God's desire and intent.

I wanna go back to where we started right at the beginning. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God and they shall be my people. Therefore, come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Remember them is unbelievers. Pursuing what the world pursues, the desires of the flesh, what is appealing to the eyes, the pride in your achievements. Come out from among them, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you. I will be a father to you, and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord God Almighty. Therefore, next verse, chapter seven, verse one. Having these promises beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness, not most filthiness, all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. Remember, the spirit is the most important one. That's the things that are hidden. You allow the light of God's word to come in and expose those things and repent of them. The flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Why do we do this? Because there's something coming, and it's so profound, and it's very, very soon. It's gonna happen, I believe, in our generation. And that's Isaiah 60, where God says, "Arise, shine, for your light has come." And the glory of Lord is risen, not descended.

Book of Acts, it descended on them. Has risen upon you. For behold, darkness shall cover the earth and deep darkness the people. Let me tell you, never in my life have I seen more darkness in our nation and deep darkness on the people of our nation. He said, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the people, but the Lord will arise over you and his glory will be seen upon you. The Gentiles, the unbelievers, will come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising. The greatest move of God, The question is, will you be one of those that are burning and shining lights in this great move of God that's coming? Or are you just going to be an observer? The choice is yours. He's returning for a glorious bride, not a defeated sick bride. So let me tell you something. Climb the mountain, pursue holiness. That's the ticket to the mountain. It's called the highway. The highway, the road that brings you to the top of the mountain, Isaiah called it the highway. Develop the highway in your heart of holiness so that you can see his presence. You can be changed from glory to glory to glory.

And that way, when he begins to move on this earth, you are a vessel that has been purified. Remember, when gold is purified, it becomes transparent. The streets of heaven are transparent. You can see right through them. A true vessel of God is one who becomes so pure that people see not the person, but the treasure in the person. We have this treasure in earthen vessels, Paul said to the Corinthian church, what is that? That treasure is the glory of God in the face of Christ Jesus. This world is going to see his glory manifest. Are you going to be one of the vessels that he's going to do it through? I believe you will. I have confidence that you will. Let me pray for you. Heavenly Father, I thank you for my brother and my sister who has gone through this course. I am asking you, Lord God, that your spirit would come upon them and that they would now be sensitive to your voice. When they read the word, they wouldn't just read it as history or as stories or as rules or regulation, but they would actually allow the Holy Spirit to bring the words alive in their heart and to create a cleansing, Lord God, that they would hear your word of correction, that they wouldn't have to go through somebody else

coming and correcting them or going through the affliction. But that they would hear your correction as they read your word and seek you passionately. And I pray that they will become a purified vessel in which you will manifest your glory in this earth too. I thank you for it, Father, in Jesus' mighty name. Amen. I want to just thank you again for journeying with me in this journey of truth. Remember, the Heart of Blaze book has so much more in it. So order, get yourself a copy. And I want to say it's been a great privilege to bring to you the word of God. And I love you so very much. And I believe the best in you. And I believe God's going to do a mighty work through you in these final days. God bless you. [MUSIC PLAYING] (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]