“Let him who walks in darkness and has no light trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God. Behold all you who kindle a fire, Who encircle yourselves with firebrands, Walk in the light of your fire and among the brands you have set ablaze. This you will have from My hand: You will lie down in torment.” -Isa 50:10-11
This is a pretty serious word about relying on our own understanding instead of getting guidance from God.
I envision these earthly firebrands as handheld torches, man-made versions of the Pillar of Fire, which was in the desert.
The Pillar of Fire is an undeniable picture of God’s guidance. Have God’s people forgotten over the years that it matters to God that we get our guidance from Him?
Notice that God never called the people of Israel to light a bunch of torches to get them through the desert nights. He never said, “If you all light your torches you’ll have enough light to see the way.” It reminds me of a bunch of people flicking their lighters and imagining the light of them to be sufficient to light their path.
How pathetic our hand-held torches are compared to the Pillar of Fire who desires to be our guide.
God is not calling me to light my own fire, to figure out my own way. He wants me to walk by the light of His fire, by the light of His Spirit, by the light of His illumination.
“By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night.” -Exodus 13:21
As long as you have the Holy Spirit you can travel by day or by night. You really don’t need to figure it out yourself.
You have a Pillar of Fire living inside of you called the Holy Spirit!
The Abiding Presence
“As Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and remain at the entrance, and the LORD would speak with Moses.” -Exodus 33;9
You’re the tent now! Do you see it?
The Pillar of Cloud is in you! The Pillar of Fire is in you! That Pillar is the Presence of the Lord, and He dwells in you.
“For the cloud of the LORD was over the tabernacle by day, and fire was in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel through all their journeys.” -Exodus 40:38
The point of all this is that the Presence of God is tangible. They saw it in the desert, they knew that God was with them.
His Presence is just as tangible today.
There are some people who are afraid to talk about the tangible presence of God. They fear that to talk like this will bring them into some kind of Charismatic Crazy Land. I have no such fears. I fully expect to experience Him because He’s alive and I’m His child. I don’t let the wackiness of other people keep me from having a vibrant relationship with the Living God. I see the craziness for what it is, and I just avoid it. It really is that simple!
God is with us. He’s ever ready to guide us. He’s ever ready to lead us in the way that we should go. Do you mean to tell me that the God of the Old Testament was more actively involved with His people than He is today? Have you read the Psalms? These people were conversational with God. Yet, there are people today that are trying to tell us that God stopped speaking after the canon of scripture was closed. Does that make any sense at all? Are we supposed to believe that we’re to pray to a God who never answers us? Are we to believe that God went mute??
I love the Word of God, it’s absolutely foundational to everything I believe and stand on, but when my mother was dying of cancer and I was holding her in my arms waiting for an ambulance to arrive, it was the Spirit of the Lord who spoke directly to me! I went from great fear to great peace in an instant. I knew that she wasn’t going to die that day because God had told me so! You can dismiss that sort of thing if you want to, but it will be to your own loss.
I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will give you counsel and watch over you. -Psalms 32:8
Tell me how that’s going to happen if God no longer speaks today?
I cannot help but point out that cessationists today talk about God in exactly the same way the Bible talks about pagan idols. They refer to a God who somehow lost his ability to speak!
You have a brain, and a mouth, and you’re able to use it, and yet you think that God has gone silent? Did He have a stroke and suddenly stop speaking?!
The idols of the nations are silver and gold, made by the hands of men. They have mouths, but cannot speak; they have eyes, but cannot see; they have ears, but cannot hear; nor is there breath in their mouths. -Psalms 135:15
Our God is not a block of wood or carved stone that’s unable to speak!
God actually wants us to learn the skill of listening to His voice. We can discover it through reading His Word and by directly hearing the Spirit of God speak to us in our situation.
It should go without saying that if we hear a voice speaking to us that contradicts the Word of God then we know that the Spirit of God has not spoken that word to us.
What a wonderful thing it is to have a God who has promised to guide us in every situation we face!
When you’re in the darkness, and you don’t know the way that you should take, the one thing you should not do is light your own fire!
When you light your own fire, it’s an insult to God.
He’s come to live inside you as a Pillar of Glorious Fire. The very Presence of the Living God is living in you. Do you presume to be brighter than He is? Do you know the way better than He does?
You see, it’s an insult to trust in your own light instead of His!
God is our Pillar of Fire promising to light our way, and yet here we are lighting our tiny little torches of human wisdom. God’s not exactly thrilled with that.
Behold, all you who kindle a fire,who array yourselves with firebrands, walk in the light of your fireand of the firebrands you have lit! This is what you will receive from My hand: You will lie down in a place of torment. -Isaiah 50:11
God makes it as clear as the noonday sun. “You wanna trust in yourself instead of Me? You can go ahead and do that, but it’s not going to end well for you!”
Manmade torches
The problem we have with the Pillar is that it has a habit of stopping at the most inconvenient times. We’re ready to move and it’s just staying there in the same place!
“Whether the cloud stayed over the tabernacle for two days or a month or a year, the Israelites would remain in camp and not set out; but when it lifted, they would set out.” -Numbers 9:22
The truth is, we get impatient when the Pillar stays in one place for too long. We begin to wonder what the delay is. Abraham and Sarah birthed Ishmael instead of waiting for Isaac. They lit their own fire and we’re walking in the aftermath of it to this very day!
Imagine if…
Imagine if the Israelites had gotten tired of the Pillar of Cloud staying in one place for too long and they just decided to move ahead anyway.
After a day’s journey, the Pillar of Cloud is now far behind them. The desert sun goes down, it gets cold and dark, and there’s no Pillar of Fire. It’s just them and some twinkling stars.
Maybe they could try to make excuses for their unbelief in the light of day, but when night came they’d be sitting in the dark. No Pillar of Fire! No light! Just a bunch of Israelites sitting in the desert in the dark by themselves!
The people complained a lot in their travels through the desert, and God wasn’t happy about it, but they were never stupid enough to leave the Presence!
They waited.
They followed the Pillar of Cloud, they followed the Pillar of Fire. Because to go on ahead, is to go on without God.
In our day
In our day, the Pillar of Presence will never leave His people. He’s come to make His home in the heart of every child of God.
He will not leave you if you decide to go ahead without Him, but the sense of His Presence will grow dim, the warmth of His burning fire will not be felt as it once was, and the light that once shone on your path will not appear as bright to you.
You will not see light again, until you pay attention to the Pillar of Fire that is living inside of you!
Once again, Jesus spoke to the people and said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows Me will never walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life. -John 8:12