“And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush. So he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed.” Exodus 3:2
In the old covenant, the way God would give people the power to do something, or say something was that the Holy Spirit would come down from heaven; the heavenly temple, then rest on that person for that particular function. Once God’s will was accomplished, the Holy Spirit would leave. Can you imagine Joseph, Moses, Gideon, David etc doing what they did without God’s favour and enablement?
In the new covenant, the Holy Spirit is still in heaven or God’s house. But heaven is now within you, the believer! The location of heaven has changed. It has shifted to you! There has been a Divine re-location! You are now the temple where the Holy Spirit rests. Jesus said that the Kingdom of Heaven is now within.
So now, the Holy Spirit rests in you to give you the power or resources you need to do whatever God wants you to do. Therefore all believing followers of Jesus Christ need to be under the influence of the Holy Spirit.
Living without the influence of the Holy Spirit will cause you be like a burning bush that gradually burns out.
The burning bush that Moses saw wasn’t consumed. This is a picture of God’s enablement, ability and grace. The bush didn’t burn out because it was burning from an eternal power source. It had a supernatural energy to burn…just like you! The resource to burn was not within the bush itself, but from God. It was from outside itself.
All believers go through a stage where we try to do God’s will, with our own resources. Why? Because we love God, we want to please Him. So we try to grow, learn and change in our own resources and self effort. God lets us go through that experience to show us that we just end up with a burnt-out bush. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you are going through an experience like that, because you are now learning to rely on God’s ability; not your own.
This is why all believers need to be constantly filled with the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 5:18 says “be being filled with the Holy Spirit”. This is living under the Holy Spirit’s influence. This is a continuous action. The Holy Spirit motivates us, inspires us, encourages us, keeps our focus so you can burn without being burnt out. He guides you and helps you live from God’s ability, not your own. That’s grace!
How to burn without being consumed;
- You now realise that the Holy Spirit lives within. He does not fade in and out.
- The voice of the Holy Spirit is discerned by knowing who God is
- Being constantly under the Holy Spirit’s influence causes burning without burn out
- This is living in God’s ability; not your own ability.
Peter C Hall 