SHOW NOTES:

• When a believer begins to reach into sonship and wants to grow in his spirit, he begins to hear about the fire.

• The refining fire that the Holy Spirit brings on a believer who is seeking to move beyond the salvation experience at first may seem to be more on a soulish level than in a person's spirit.

• A relatively new Christian can begin moving in the gifts or speaking in tongues and become excited about areas he is moving in, but it may really be mostly the expression of the soul.

• John the Baptist emphasized that Jesus was coming to baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire, which was superior to the baptism that John had ministered.

• As the Lord begins to put the cross or the fire to a person's life, he feels very uncomfortable and may even try to back out of the pressure on his circumstances.

• There comes a point in a person's life where he realizes he has an Adamic nature that God is trying to refine out of him.

QUOTATIONS:

• I think one of the things we're looking at in the restoration, and salvation, and then the baptism of the Holy Spirit, is many people went off on a soulish realm to the degree that they thought the soulish realm was the anointing. And it was not.

• I don't think the understanding was there on what “the fire” meant.

• I don't think I ever realized we were born with chaff. I always felt like chaff came as a development as we grew up, and that's not true.

• A part of the old nature was called chaff, and the chaff had to be burned off. It couldn't remain if we were going to come into the presence of a holy God.

• You have to realize too that God doesn't technically put the fire on us. We are beaten, and that is how you get rid of the chaff. You're beaten, and then it is thrown in the air, and the wind takes it off. But then when it is done, to make sure the chaff is gone, they pick it up and burn it.

• God wants to perfect His people-- body, soul, and spirit. There are stages and times when God deals with us; we don't just stop at the initial experience of salvation.

• I think there's a carefulness, when you talk about the different levels of Christianity. We can become judges, and that is not good. We must let God be the judge, and that judgment can take you out of the game, because God will not allow you to be the judge.

• I think there is a calling for the ones that want to go on with the Lord and allow Him to burn off all the chaff, all of the soul-level stuff that we've lived with all of our lives.

REFERENCES:

Malachi 3:3 He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, so that they may present to the Lord offerings in righteousness.

I Corinthians 14:12 So also you, since you are zealous of spiritual gifts seek to abound for the edification of the church.

Matthew 3:11 “As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove His sandals; He will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Matthew 3:12 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 3:5-6 Jesus answered “Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit.

Romans 12:1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

TAKE AWAY:

As a believer yields to the purging and purifying work of God, they are filled with His divine nature. Through this transformation, they are equipped with God’s love and the qualities needed to fulfill their foreordained purpose in His Kingdom. Across the world, remnants of believers are being prepared to take their place in the unfolding growth of God’s Kingdom.

Ken: I think one of the things we're looking at in the restoration and salvation, and then the baptism of the Holy Spirit, many people went off on a soulish realm to the degree that they thought the soulish realm was the anointing, and it was not.

Debbie: It started out as a pure thing.

Ken: It did.

Debbie: And then as people get involved and people get more into it, it became more of a soulish thing. Now it's partial truth.

Ron: I think a lot of that has to do with the lack of apostolic teaching and guidelines. Like you said, it started probably very pure—people reaching and crying out to God. The Holy Spirit fell on them. They began moving in the gifts and everything, and that's great. But then the soul takes over a lot of times, and it becomes more the soul actually doing things that the Holy Spirit's really not. That could be curbed by an apostolic ministry that has revelation and knows how to bring the teaching and guidelines like it was done in the first century. That's what Paul was doing, or what Peter was doing in the first century. He talked about tongues. He goes, “Hey, I speak in tongues more than you all,” but in certain cases, we don't speak tongues in church unless there's an interpreter—and then only two or three times. And so he was not discouraging tongues; he was just saying there's a place for them. And really, in church, I'd rather prophesy than speak in tongues because everybody's edified.

Ken: I think what they forgot in all of this is that John the Baptist said that when Jesus came, He would baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. And I don't think the understanding was there on what the fire meant. Maybe it was a sign that appeared on the heads of people like it did in the 120, but that was not the fire He was talking about. It's the fire of everyday relationship with God as we walk with Him, and He puts a fire to our soulish realm. And by that, every experience that we have to go through, some of that soulish realm is burned off. Yeah, and that's really the truth because the sum total of all the things we've gone through is what's created us into who we are today, really.

So what they did, which is really important, is they began to pray that God would take them out of those circumstances, off the cross, out of the fire—instead of being conditioned or brought forth by the fire or changed by the fire. They became addicted to trying to get out of it.

Debbie: But I think what Ron was saying about an apostolic ministry not being in their midst, if they had had that, they would've had more of the anointing and the teaching and the availability to understand what was going on. But a lot of them didn't accept the men of God that God sent to them. They wanted someone else to do it for them. They did not want to enter into it themselves.

Ken: I don't think I ever realized we were born with the chaff.

Debbie: Exactly.

Ken: I never realized that. I always felt like chaff came as a development as we grew up, and that's not true. We came in with an old nature. A part of that old nature was called chaff, and the chaff had to be burned off. It had to be taken care of. It couldn't remain if we were going to come into the presence of a holy God.

Ron: I believe that there are stages for every person's walk. You're wooed by the Holy Spirit to come closer to the Lord, and as you do, you go through more fire so you can come closer to the Lord. You can stop that yourself. You don't have to. God's not gonna force you. He'll receive you to Himself at a certain level. As far as the fires of judgment go, that's for really the people that are obstinate and rebellious, or they turn from the truth and they receive a lie.

I'm talking about just an everyday Christian that has received some truth. We don't put that down because it's their choice. If that's the level of relationship they want with the Lord, hey, that's between them and the Lord. There are those who continue to press in, press in, press in because they want to walk in full sonship, and that means the cross, and it means the fire, and it means discipline, and it means maturity. So it's really a choice. He never forces you. That's not the Lord—to force you and say you have to do this. No, He’s not. He’ll woo you.

Ed: You have to realize too that God doesn't technically put the fire on us. We are beaten, and that's how you get rid of the chaff. You’re beaten, and then they throw it in the air, and the wind takes it off. But then when it's done—all of that chaff—to make sure it's gone, they pick it up and burn it. No, you're beaten by the Lord and put through things, and the chaff falls off. To make sure it just can't come back on, it gets burned.

Ken: I know you're right, Ron, about different stages. When we're saved, when we're born again, we're taken out of the domain of darkness into the domain of Christ. We become born again in the Spirit. It's about the spirit being ready to meet God. However, God wants to perfect His people—body, soul, and spirit—according to Paul. So as we walk on with God, if we're really wanting to please the Lord, we allow the Lord to take us through these different stages, and we submit our spirits to it. Then the soul level is dealt with, and even the body is dealt with. So there are stages and times when God deals with us. We don’t just stop at the initial experience of salvation.

Debbie: No. If we do, we're not gonna go any farther. No, we won't go any further. That's it. It reminds me of Romans 12: “Present yourselves a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service of worship.” That's what He is expecting—a reasonable sacrifice. We give ourselves. But you know what? There are people that choose not to, and they're still having a walk with God.

Ken:

It's really a matter of choice. People choose where they're going to be. If they want to stay where they first received the Lord Jesus Christ and love the salvation and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and that's where they want to stay—they don't want to go past that stage—but just try to walk with God in that venue, I think there is a calling for ones that want to go on with the Lord and allow Him to burn off all of the chaff, all of the soul-level stuff that we've lived with all of our lives. The creative change that comes to the man of God who walks with Him is an amazing thing.