By Susan Tang
(An excerpt taken from the book The Anointed Priest Who Sins)
So many today are burning for ministry and not for God. Burning for ministry is actually indirectly burning for self and living for selfish gains. So much has been stressed about building our ministry, our church and our gifting but not our relationship with God. The undiscerning will think that burning for ministry is being zealous for God. No, it is not. True zeal for God will always consume or corrode self. We know this because both David and Jesus confessed that their zeal for God had burned up the self in them. That is the meaning of "The zeal of thine house (for God) hath eaten me up."
The manifestation of the burning for self within the Body of Christ is frightening today. This is the reason why so many have burned out, fallen out or have been taken out of the ministry. God's promise is, "He that doeth the will of God abideth forever" (1 John 2:17). Many have claimed that they are doing the will of God, but where are they today? They have lost the abiding, and have vanished into thin air.
When we burn for God, He becomes the focus and the purpose of our life. But when we have a zeal that burns so much for ministry until it has no time for God, then it is a zeal that is totally unrelated to or estranged from God. It is a zeal in which the vital element of self denial is absent. It is counterfeit fire. Counterfeit fire is fire that is not taken from the altar of burnt sacrifice. (Burnt sacrifice always means self denial or death.) Nadab and Abihu died because they offered to God a fire of their own kindling. Instead of taking fire from the altar of burnt sacrifice which fire originally came from heaven and was deposited at that sacred altar, they offered to God defiled fire. Many anointed priests today 'died' early because they offered to God fleshly and defiled fire.
When we burn for God we will make time to connect with Him. Unfortunately, today's prophets and priests have lost the joy of wanting to go into the private chamber behind closed doors for communion with God. Living the hidden life has also become an unknown experience to so many. The more we live for the 'greater,' the more we should retreat from the public and build up our inner life. Most things done in the public today are not aimed to please Him, but are done to secure the admiration of man and for self display.
Drawing near to God is the highest human experience because it requires the help of the Holy Spirit and demands the exercise of all our highest faculties. Unfortunately, most prophets and priests have lost it. They are so busy burning for self that they have prostituted even the soul's greatest privilege of having communion with God. We are living in difficult days. The advent of globalization and the new world culture have ushered in godless days and living on the anointing upon us is not enough. We have to live by the anointing within. We have to draw from that inward Spring and that indwelling Presence by making the contact daily and unhurriedly.
In the days of Noah, when God flooded the earth to destroy the wicked, the waters did not only fall from above. The waters that fell 'upon the earth' from above were not sufficient to cause the deluge. It was the water that came from within the springs of the earth that was really powerful. The earth was flooded out by water that came from two sources - above and within.
"The same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened" (Genesis 7:11).
Many priests and prophets have failed because they only lived by water (or the anointing) that came upon them. They did not know how to draw from the water that came from the springs of the deep (the anointing within).
They could not draw from the Fountain within because they were too busy - busy connecting with the outward ostentatious things that have no spiritual value or eternal validity. Time is spent to connect with the 'accessories' but not with solid reality. We have failed to understand that ministry is taking the Lord's yoke and bearing His burdens. His yoke and His burden are light - not stressful, not vexing, not competitive, not vain and definitely not oppressive.
When ministry gets to the point when we feel vexed, heavy, vain, competitive, and we cannot connect with Him, then we have missed it. We are NOT taking His yoke and bearing His burden, (we are taking our own yoke and bearing our own burdens), and we are not burning for Him but for self. The fire we burn is called 'strange fire' and it is the equivalent of what Nadab and Abihu offered before God (Leviticus 10:1-3). It is not hard to tell that this is the fire of our own kindling because such fire always burns out our appetite for God, burn out the joy of contemplative prayers and the meditation of the Word.
When Mary and Joseph, the earthly parents of Jesus, discovered their loss - that Jesus was missing from their midst, they immediately stopped their journey and went back to Jerusalem to 'retrieve' Him before they journeyed on. They refused to take the journey until the 'substance' came back. May you do the same. You have burned for ministry and have been burned out. When Delilah came, you could not stand up against her because you had lost all your strength by allowing her to shave off all your hair. Thank God that hair can grow back! Samson's story had a happy ending. May yours too be the same.
May you now learn to burn for God. When you do, you will not burn out or fall out. Hear the voice of your Saviour inviting you to learn from Him, take from Him and bear His burden.
(An excerpt taken from the book The Anointed Priest Who Sins)
So many today are burning for ministry and not for God. Burning for ministry is actually indirectly burning for self and living for selfish gains. So much has been stressed about building our ministry, our church and our gifting but not our relationship with God. The undiscerning will think that burning for ministry is being zealous for God. No, it is not. True zeal for God will always consume or corrode self. We know this because both David and Jesus confessed that their zeal for God had burned up the self in them. That is the meaning of "The zeal of thine house (for God) hath eaten me up."
The manifestation of the burning for self within the Body of Christ is frightening today. This is the reason why so many have burned out, fallen out or have been taken out of the ministry. God's promise is, "He that doeth the will of God abideth forever" (1 John 2:17). Many have claimed that they are doing the will of God, but where are they today? They have lost the abiding, and have vanished into thin air.
When we burn for God, He becomes the focus and the purpose of our life. But when we have a zeal that burns so much for ministry until it has no time for God, then it is a zeal that is totally unrelated to or estranged from God. It is a zeal in which the vital element of self denial is absent. It is counterfeit fire. Counterfeit fire is fire that is not taken from the altar of burnt sacrifice. (Burnt sacrifice always means self denial or death.) Nadab and Abihu died because they offered to God a fire of their own kindling. Instead of taking fire from the altar of burnt sacrifice which fire originally came from heaven and was deposited at that sacred altar, they offered to God defiled fire. Many anointed priests today 'died' early because they offered to God fleshly and defiled fire.
When we burn for God we will make time to connect with Him. Unfortunately, today's prophets and priests have lost the joy of wanting to go into the private chamber behind closed doors for communion with God. Living the hidden life has also become an unknown experience to so many. The more we live for the 'greater,' the more we should retreat from the public and build up our inner life. Most things done in the public today are not aimed to please Him, but are done to secure the admiration of man and for self display.
Drawing near to God is the highest human experience because it requires the help of the Holy Spirit and demands the exercise of all our highest faculties. Unfortunately, most prophets and priests have lost it. They are so busy burning for self that they have prostituted even the soul's greatest privilege of having communion with God. We are living in difficult days. The advent of globalization and the new world culture have ushered in godless days and living on the anointing upon us is not enough. We have to live by the anointing within. We have to draw from that inward Spring and that indwelling Presence by making the contact daily and unhurriedly.
In the days of Noah, when God flooded the earth to destroy the wicked, the waters did not only fall from above. The waters that fell 'upon the earth' from above were not sufficient to cause the deluge. It was the water that came from within the springs of the earth that was really powerful. The earth was flooded out by water that came from two sources - above and within.
"The same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened" (Genesis 7:11).
Many priests and prophets have failed because they only lived by water (or the anointing) that came upon them. They did not know how to draw from the water that came from the springs of the deep (the anointing within).
They could not draw from the Fountain within because they were too busy - busy connecting with the outward ostentatious things that have no spiritual value or eternal validity. Time is spent to connect with the 'accessories' but not with solid reality. We have failed to understand that ministry is taking the Lord's yoke and bearing His burdens. His yoke and His burden are light - not stressful, not vexing, not competitive, not vain and definitely not oppressive.
When ministry gets to the point when we feel vexed, heavy, vain, competitive, and we cannot connect with Him, then we have missed it. We are NOT taking His yoke and bearing His burden, (we are taking our own yoke and bearing our own burdens), and we are not burning for Him but for self. The fire we burn is called 'strange fire' and it is the equivalent of what Nadab and Abihu offered before God (Leviticus 10:1-3). It is not hard to tell that this is the fire of our own kindling because such fire always burns out our appetite for God, burn out the joy of contemplative prayers and the meditation of the Word.
When Mary and Joseph, the earthly parents of Jesus, discovered their loss - that Jesus was missing from their midst, they immediately stopped their journey and went back to Jerusalem to 'retrieve' Him before they journeyed on. They refused to take the journey until the 'substance' came back. May you do the same. You have burned for ministry and have been burned out. When Delilah came, you could not stand up against her because you had lost all your strength by allowing her to shave off all your hair. Thank God that hair can grow back! Samson's story had a happy ending. May yours too be the same.
May you now learn to burn for God. When you do, you will not burn out or fall out. Hear the voice of your Saviour inviting you to learn from Him, take from Him and bear His burden.
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