Bring Your Lips to the Altar

I spoke for three sessions this week at the Fire Revolution, an annual event at a friends Church in Sta Rosa, Laguna, Philippines. Other speakers including Pastor Ray Llarena and the Pastor of the Church, Tom Molina. It was AWESOME! Every session was amazing!

On the final night, Pastor Tom asked me to speak with him in a tag-team. He would start and I would end.

He spoke from Jeremiah 20:9 (NIV) "But if I say, “I will not mention his word or speak anymore in his name,” his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot."

I followed with Isaiah 6 with emphasis on verses 5-8 (NIV)

"⁵ “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.”

⁶ Then one of the seraphim flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. ⁷ With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.”

⁸ Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”

Earlier in the day, I was asking the Lord what he wanted to do in the final session and He spoke to my heart saying, "tell the people to bring their lips to the altar" and then I was impressed with this very familiar passage.

I'm not going to print the sermons (Tom's and mine) here, but a brief synopsis is that in order for fire to spread, we have got to be touched by the Lord to speak His Word and go forth on His behalf. What we wanted was not normal fire from earthly altars, but we wanted fire from that altar in heaven that the angel took the coal from. We wanted our lips to be touched with fire from heaven so that we would be prepared to be asked by the Lord and then to respond to Him that we will go spread the fire!

I have not experienced an altar ministry time in this manner before. I would lightly touch the lips of many of the hundreds who flooded the altar and they were completely set ablaze by the Spirit most with their bodies completely reacting to the fire on their lips. The room was filled with sounds of crying out and wailing in the presence of God. Many were baptized with the Holy Spirit and many began to prophesy in loud voices.

I am personally changed by the ministry of the Holy Spirit last night. I will never be the same. I have fresh fire shut up in my bones that must be released and my mouth is on fire to proclaim the Word of the Lord.

But this is only possible because I have soaked myself in the Word of God and because I am open to the the Spirit of God. Just as those hungry people who attended the Fire Revolution are. Not everyone has fire shut up in their bones and it doesn't come simply by laying on of hands. It comes through the discipline of feasting on God's Word day and night, becoming one with God in purpose and learning to love what He loves and hate what He hates (Hebrews 1:9).

Friends, let me encourage you to become like Jeremiah and to submit yourself to God like Isaiah did. Purposefully get full of the Word of God and then bring your lips to the altar of God and allow Him to set you ablaze for Him!