And so the Global Prophecy Signals continue with this triple cluster…

In yesterday’s God-incidental re-blogging of Love Not The World (a dream of churches and people being swallowed up) my fellow blogger R.J Dawson noted its similarity to his post of three years ago in Real Christianity – The Great Awakening and thought my readers would appreciate its content. Well I certainly do…so thank you very much RJ.

Having time only for a quick glance I decided to read it when back at my desk for today’s full blogging day. Rather than re-blog, it’s now copied below for ease of reading – preceded by a couple of other pieces of this ‘invisible jigsaw’.

And exactly as happened 2 x 12 days ago (see New Year’s Day reflective trilogy) , our morning reading from Sanctuary – Moments In His Presence based on Moses at the ‘burning’ bush and hearing from the Lord God, this topic was reinforced by subsequent material – and thus once more confirming the validity of each message.

Next, when at my desk and opening up email’s in-tray here’s what I found from Glasgow Prophetic Centre:

Lionbites: CHANGED BY ALL-CONSUMING FIRE

God has heard your desire to be a ‘world changer’. This is His desire for you too, but you must allow Him to change you first. And He says to you, “I came to set the world on fire by igniting your heart with my all-consuming fire.

“Will you meet with me and allow me to consume all of you? Don’t keep any part of yourself from me. Let my love come in and burn up the things that have held you back. Don’t hide or try cover up these things, but surrender them to me and allow me to burn you with my love. Let me ignite your heart with a passion that burns for me. For this world truly needs fiery ones who know the purity and passion of my love. Go and burn for me, and as you do, you will truly be one who changes your community, your nation, and your world.”

Luke 12:49 (TPT) – I have come to set the earth on fire. And how I long for every heart to be already ablaze with this fiery passion for God!

Hebrews 12:28-29 (TPT) – Since we are receiving our rights to an unshakeable kingdom we should be extremely thankful and offer God the purest worship that delights his heart as we lay down our lives in absolute surrender, filled with awe. For our God is a holy, devouring fire!

Last, but not least, with kind permission here’s R.J’s splendid offering:

PURIFICATION BY FIRE – Separating the Wheat from the Chaff

 “His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” [Matthew 3:12]

The grain kernel of wheat is composed of two parts: The inner part that we eat and the inedible outer hull. The inedible part must be separated from the edible part. There are two ways to remove the outer hull: Threshing and Winnowing.

THRESHING

Threshing was used on grains in which the hull was attached tightly to the grain kernel. In the days of our Lord, such covered grains were either soaked in water, or were lightly milled or even pounded upon to loosen the hull in order to remove it. The latter processes often damaged the edible grain.

WINNOWING

However, when dealing with grains in which the hull was relatively loose and light, little or no threshing was required. A winnowing fork was used instead to cast the grain into the air allowing the wind to separate the inedible hulls from the edible grain kernels. The light, papery hulls would float or fly away in the wind while the edible grain fell to the ground to be collected. These light separated inedible hulls are called chaff, a word derived from Middle English.

In both of these methods the unfit for consumption outer hull had to be removed from the grain kernel. Once removed the hull residue (chaff) was burned.

Keep in mind what the Lord Jesus had to go through as the new seed of all creation. He was baptized by John as our example though it was personally unnecessary. And though He had no hard outer hull He underwent the extreme process of hull removal on our behalf.

Both John the Immerser and the Lord Jesus used the rich imagery of hull removal in their preaching as illustrative of the process of salvation. The otherwise soft, warm, and loving human heart, characterized perfectly by the happy innocent hearts of young children, becomes hardened by a life of sin and rebellion against God. In time a hard outer shell forms over the human heart and creates an entirely different human nature from the original.

HEART CIRCUMCISION

This requires what the Lord refers to as heart circumcision:

“So circumcise your heart, and stiffen your neck no longer.” [Deuteronomy 10:16]

“Circumcise yourselves to the LORD and remove the foreskins of your heart, men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, or else My wrath will go forth like fire and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your deeds.” [Jeremiah 4:4]

Since human will and free choice must be involved in the process of salvation, the outer hulls of our hearts can only be removed by voluntarily submitting to the process of spiritual threshing or winnowing. For those with very hard hulls the process will be more difficult. For those with lighter papery hulls removal will be less difficult. But in either case, since all have sinned regardless of degree, ALL hearts MUST be circumcised or salvation is not possible. EVERYONE MUST undergo a new birth.

We can see by the very clear illustration of heart circumcision (circle cut) that salvation and new birth (being born again) is actually a reverting back or returning to one’s original created condition. Though real Christians will still have to battle their old nature in this world after undergoing a new birth and receiving real salvation, the new nature takes over and regains authority over the old sin nature.

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! [2Corinthians 5:17 NRSV]

He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. [John 1:11-13]

“You must be born again.” [John 3:7]

 Submitting to heart circumcision is not an easy choice but obviously the best choice anyone could ever possibly make. If we have a hard outer shell on our heart, it is not so fun to subject ourselves to light milling or necessary pounding to remove it. It is also not so fun to be thrown up in the air with a winnowing fork so our old nature can become dust in the wind.

Keep in mind that John the Immerser was sent to soak the nation of Israel in water to loosen its national hull and thereby gain a softening of its national heart prior to the Lord’s ministry. The goal was threefold:

1. Making the national heart receptive to the Lord
2. Gaining national repentance—a wholesale turning away from sin and rebellion against God—and
3. Undergoing a national heart circumcision.

The nation of Israel would thus be divided based on its response to John’s ministry and later the Lord’s. The first camp would include all those who honored John’s and the Lord’s ministry and complied. The second camp would be composed of all those who did not.

The Lord referred to the first camp as being composed of sheep, wheat, and good trees with good fruit—“the blessed of My Father”.

He referred to the second camp as made up of goats, chaff, tares, and bad trees with bad fruit—“accursed ones”.

For all those who refuse the great opportunity of salvation and being included in those returning to the Lord’s original sinless creation, however, something must be done with them.

If it was grain kernels with very hard and stuck fast outer hulls that refused the proper treatment toward removal, such grain would be no good for anything and would certainly not be edible. But even if it was grain with light papery hulls, if winnowing was refused it also would remain inedible.

The only thing to be done with such bad grain that still contained an otherwise edible kernel was throw it in the pile of the inedible chaff that was removed from the good grain.

This is what John meant when he said the following:

“His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” [Matthew 3:12]

In order for the Lord to continue the process of new creation, the following verses illustrate more examples of allegorical entities which must be eliminated through the ultimate means of purification—Fire:

“Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” [Matthew 3:10]

“The tares are gathered up and burned with fire.” [Matthew 13:40]

“The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness, and will throw them into the furnace of fire.” [Matthew 13:41-42]

“The angels will come forth and take out the wicked from among the righteous, and will throw them into the furnace of fire.” [Matthew 13:49-50]

“Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones (goats), into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels…” [Matthew 25:41]

“I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.” [John 15:5-6][1]

© 2016 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved  [1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

[Digital Globe with Hand by Watcharakun, Puzzle In Sky by Idea Go and Puzzle Globe and Book by Thanunkorn, all courtesy Freedigitalphotos.net]