Refiner's Fire

"You have tested us O God; You have purified us like silver melted in a crucible." Psalm 66:10

I was a part of a prayer group this morning that closed with us listening to the beautiful song, "Refiner's Fire." I hadn't heard the song in a very long time, but its beauty and its power to speak to our day was so clear. The Church, more than any place in my lifetime, is in deep need of His refining fire. The lyrics of that song are, "Refiner's fire, my heart's one desire is to be holy, set apart for You Lord. I choose to be holy, set apart for You my Master. Ready to do Your will."

It's a beautiful song to listen to, and not one hard to sing.....unless we really understand what it is we ask for when we sing it. Psalm 66:10 speaks of a crucible. This is a container in which metals, usually precious, were placed in order to be melted down under intense heat and fire. In the melting, all the impurities would come to the surface and be scraped off, so that the gold or silver would be purified. When we call for the Refiner's fire, this is what we're asking Him to do with us. Our self life is the crucible, and our hearts are the precious metal. We invite Him to apply the intense heat and fire, and His scraping away of the impurities that are sure to surface. In the metalworking process, the impurities tend to look like scum. They do in the spiritual one as well. Do we desire this? Do we really desire to be holy people, part of a truly holy church? Or, do we just like to sing songs that touch our emotions but leave our hearts alone and unchanged?

Through the events of this day, the Father is bringing us to our own crucible. We have allowed, even welcomed impurities into our hearts and minds. Worship of self is liberally mixed in with worship of Him. We've grown quite comfortable with many impurities that the Bible calls sin. We've come to be at peace with compromise, unbelief, and rejection of the authority of Scripture. We've distorted His grace to the degree that its become so cheapened as to be almost meaningless. It cost the Father everything in the giving of His Son, Jesus Christ to extend it to us, but we feel it costs us nothing at all to receive and live in it. The result is a world disintegrating around us, and a church, at least in the west, that hasn't shown an ability to respond to it in the power of His risen life. Thus the need for the Refiner's fire.

I once had a discussion with a brother who took some issue with some things I wrote about the need for personal and corporate holiness. He felt that holiness wasn't a central part of Christ's message, and we err by making it part of ours. Let that sink in....God said that we're to "be holy as I am holy," and Jesus said that when you see Me, you see the Father. I and the Father are One." We are both called to and commanded to be holy. Our flesh hates the very word, and will rise up against it every time. God's response is holy, purifying fire. It is the need of this hour, this day. Now. Do we recognize it as our need as well?

Holiness of life is not the keeping of a book of rules. Neither is it a result of our working as hard as we can at being like Christ. These just keep "self" at the center. True holiness is living out, in ever increasing ways, His Life within us. He molds us, shapes us, and yes, melt us as He refines the deep impurities that are within us all. The process will always involve His refining fire. It will also involve our willingness to be yielded to that fire. Will we yield? Will we be holy unto the Lord?

Blessings,
Pastor O