I talked with Mandy today about the differences between New Testament and Old Testament imagery. The NT talks a lot about death and life and being washed clean...all fairly common images in today's society. We have become so desensitized to the horrors of the world that death does not shock us like it should.
The OT, however, uses awesome images like a Valley of Dry Bones (Ezekiel) gaining flesh and muscle and coming back to life or a plague of locusts devouring everything in its sight (Joel). If we imagined sin as something that literally consumed us, bit by agonizing bit, screaming for help that won't come, until we are left dead, how real would it be for us then? The God of the OT doesn't play around.
Which leads me to arson.
We sometimes think of our conversion as a happy time, with wet hair and hugs and someone taking us to lunch afterwards, if we're really lucky. John the Baptizer comments that he baptizes with water, but there is one coming who will baptize with fire and the Holy Spirit. What if when we accepted that Spirit, the holy tongues of fire descended and we burst into a righteous flame, like the burning bush, aglow with the love and grace and awesome power of our God? Maybe then we would get it...the importance of life and the devastation of sin.
I want to be an arsonist for God, lighting the world on fire with the Divine Spark until we are all a mighty conflagration, consuming everyone we come in contact with in the warmth of His love.
Got a match?
"For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God." Deuteronomy 4:24
No comments:
Post a Comment