Light the Fire!

Introduction

Very pleasant good morning to everyone. Uh, so you’re not used to getting up this early. Oh my. I thought last night might be a short night for me. There’s a Harley Davidson convention going on at the hotel I was in. Thanks. I think I was the only non-Harley guy there. But let me tell you a little bit about Harley Davidson guys. They’re getting some gray hair. And most of the guys who can afford those bikes are probably doctors and lawyers and accountants and all those kinds of things and whatnot. But I noticed last night that they all went to bed early. Which was a good thing. So I hope you rested well. It’s good to be back in Orlando. I grew up uh here, so to speak.

I went to elementary school on the other side of Orlando. And later preached at uh Parr uh Street for uh one summer 1978. So uh I’m always uh it always feels like I’m coming home a little bit when I come to Orlando, although I don’t ever notice it. I mean I don’t recognize anything because of road construction. Is road construction here ever end? You know, I just growing place. Growing place. So thanks for having me, and uh look forward to the day, and Ken is right. We’re gonna do a lot of, we’re gonna cram a lot in a little. And so I’m glad you’re here this morning, and I’m gonna ask you to take your Bible, hope you have it with you, and go over to the third chapter of Exodus.

Way over to the left, in the old. Exodus chapter 3, and beginning in verse 1.

Want to talk a little bit this morning at this hour about lighting the fire. Because I think we need to. Exodus 3, beginning in verse 1. Now Moses was pasturing the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horab, the mountain of God. The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush. And he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. So Moses said, I must turn aside and see this marvelous sight. Why is this bush not being burned up? When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush, and he said, Moses, Moses.

And he said, Here I am. And he said, Do not come near here. Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you stand is holy ground. He said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. And then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. The Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I’ve given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their suffering. So I have come down to deliver them. Verse 10. Now therefore come and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may bring my people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?

And that I should be, that I should bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt. And he said, Certainly I will be with you, verse 13. Moses said to God, Behold, I’m going to the sons of Israel, and I will say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you. Now they may say to me, What is what is his name? What will I say? And God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, I am, has sent me to you. We’ll stop there. Do you understand that many of us are bored? We’re just bored. It’s not that we don’t have anything to do. We have plenty to do. In fact, in some kind of weird way, we are busier than ever.

But then again, boredom is not defined by a lack of busyness. Boredom is defined by a lack of mission. Boredom is defined by a lack of purpose. And so you can have lots to do and still be bored. I think that’s why the gaming industry is so big. People get, they get addicted to all of this gaming. Because the gaming gives us a goal. The gaming gives us a mission. It’s a mini mission, M I N I, but it’s a mission nonetheless. And so I can become a race car driver. I can become an assassin. I can become a fighter pilot. I can become an angry bird. There’s no threat. There’s no threat to my well-being. There’s no real risk. There’s no real adventure. It’s kind of all up here.

In 1951, a guy by the name of Ray Bradbury wrote a book that I had to read in high school. I’m guessing some of you have read it too. Fahrenheit 451. And in Fahrenheit 451, the premise of that book was to look ahead into the future to a society that was obsessed with entertainment. In Fahrenheit 451, the walls of the home were televisions. Not that the television was on the wall. The wall was a television. And in Fahrenheit 451, the firemen didn’t go around putting out the fires. The firemen started them. Because they were burning books. Because everybody knows books are dangerous, and books have ideas, and books will challenge people to think for themselves. But the interesting thing about Fahrenheit 451 and this culture obsessed with entertainment was that nobody was happy.

Nobody was happy. They just kind of existed. Something was about to destroy them. But they were oblivious.

Now you fast forward 70 years. And we have televisions the size of our walls. We have little devices in our pockets, and we can listen to music and watch movies every second of the day. There’s not a second that goes by that we can’t possibly be entertained. So how is it that we are bored? You see, if you’re bored with life, you need something that no Netflix series is going to fix. That no means of entertainment is going to solve. That no app on your phone is going to fix it for you. Because what you need is a mission. What you need is a life purpose. And you need it to be real. Something that is bigger than you are. Something that you can’t grasp the magnitude of, but you know that it is huge.

Something about which you’re not just some kind of passive observer watching a screen. But you’re an active participant. Because you see, when God created you, he didn’t just create you on purpose, he created you for purpose. And I think we forget that. But before you can find your purpose, there’s something you got to see. And what you have to see, ladies and gentlemen, is that we serve a God who is not boring. We serve a God who will get your attention if you will look up long enough to give it. As is the case with Moses in Exodus chapter 3, where God reveals Himself as the God of the fire. If you’re taking notes this morning, I’m going to give you three things. As you look at this text about Moses and God and the fire, there’s three things I want you to see that I think is going to help us in our culture.

1. Fire Is Dangerous and Attractive, So Is God’s Holiness

Three ways God is like fire. So write this down. Number one, like fire is both dangerous and attractive. So is God’s holiness. Like fire is both dangerous and attractive, so is God’s holiness. Just like Moses, when you see fire, you are drawn to it. It pulls you in. And yet you understand that with fire, there has to be a healthy respect. Because if you get too close to the fire, you will get burned. So fire is at once attractive and dangerous. Like God. Now, Moses was a lot like us. He was really busy. But he was bored. He was a sheepherder. Moses had a job. He had a responsibility to fulfill. And sheep herding wasn’t exactly an eight to five, five day a week, clock in, clock out kind of position.

So he had he had some things to do. He had a lot to do. He had responsibility. He did not lack for something to do with his life. But what Moses did lack was mission. And that’s why you read in verse 2 and verse 3 the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire in the midst of a bush. And Moses in verse 3 said, I’ve got to go check this out. Because fire caught his eye, just like fire catches our eye. And he turns aside and he starts investigating in verse 4. And it was the Lord now who calls out to him from the midst of the bush. And he says, Moses, Moses, and he says, Here I am. And Moses starts to come closer, and he says, stop.

I think that’s what he says. Isn’t that what he says in verse 5? Do not come near here. I wrote the word stop. Stop. And he said, take off your sandals, because you’re standing on holy ground. First of all, we struggle with the word holy. We do. Because when we think we think holy, a lot of times we just go to the pretentious, holier than thou kind of thing. But God is a different kind of holy. God is another kind of holy. God is a set-apart kind of holy, which is the definition of holy. And so what God is trying to get Moses to see, rather than holier than thou, he is holy art thou. Big difference. And so the fire of God’s holiness is attractive and dangerous.

What happens when you throw something into the fire? Well, it burns up. The fire consumes it, doesn’t it? The fire turns it to ashes. And so as Moses is getting closer to the fire, God says, stop, don’t come any closer. Because the combination of God’s holy fire and your sin will kill you. And so God says, stop. Stop right there. Let me ask you a question. How many of you have been to the Grand Canyon? Anybody been to the Grand Canyon? Go ahead, or you can raise your hand. It’s okay. Anybody? Nobody over here has been to the Grand Canyon. Y’all got to, oh, you have? Y’all got to get out more. The Grand Canyon is an amazing place. And it’s one of those places that when you go there, you don’t want to just sit in your car.

You want to walk up and get closer and closer and closer. And if you’ve never been, if you’ve never been to the Grand Canyon and you’ve got this vision of fences up everywhere and all that kind of thing. No. There’s no fences. There’s signs. It says, don’t go any further, warning, danger, whatever. And so parents who take their kids to the Grand Canyon get real nervous. Because the beauty of the place brings you in. But the danger of the place gives you respect. Nobody. Nobody goes to the Grand Canyon and takes a running, flying leap off of the edge, yelling, cannonball. Nobody does that. Because there’s two words that describe that person. Well, it could be dumb and dumber. But it’s better dumb and dead. Because you have to respect.

You have to respect the Grand Canyon. It’s the same with God. Staring at the fire of God’s holiness is mesmerizing. And yet you can’t go in. You can’t get closer. Because what is beautiful is also deadly. And ladies and gentlemen, that’s why there can be no such thing as a bored Christian. How can that be? Nobody goes to the Grand Canyon. Nobody goes to the Grand Canyon and looks over there and goes, ooh, that’s a deep hole. Let’s go. Nobody does that. I love the story of the family that we’re going to, they’re going to take a trip all the way across the country. And they had a little kid and they gave the kid a journal, and they said, as we drive across the country, we want you to write down things you see that you want to remember that’s interesting to you.

And so every day they would see something as they make their way across the country. And they got to noticing the little kid never wrote anything. He never wrote a thing in his journal until they get to the Grand Canyon. And the little boy gets to the Grand Canyon and he looks at the Grand Canyon and he turns and he runs right back to the car and he grabs his journal and he writes as fast as he can. And that night the parents are like, what did he write? Curiosity overtook them. And so the little boy went to bed, and the parents got out the journal. And they opened it up, and this is what it said. Today I spitted a mile.

I love it. I love it. Here’s my point. God is. God is attractive. But God is also dangerous. And if God is boring you, then you haven’t come face to face with the fire of his holiness. And maybe one of the reasons we don’t get face to face with the fire of his holiness is we’re too busy looking at our screens. We’re too busy being entertained. And the problem is when we spend too much face planted time in a screen and not notice the awesome power of our God, the great I am, then we lose sense of who God is. And when you lose sense of who God is, you lose sense of who you are. And when you lose sense of who you are, then you start remaking God in your image.

And when you remake God in your image, God always gets smaller. And you always get bigger. And that’s when it happens. As God gets smaller and we get bigger, we get perturbed. Because God’s not running the world the way I think it ought to be run.

Why don’t you fix this? You know? Social reengineering. Why don’t you fix this, God? And so rather than being grateful to God for what we have and mindful of the blessings we have, we get put out with him. We get entitled. Because God’s not running things the way I think it ought to be run. So the next time you go to the Grand Canyon, I want you to do a little experiment. Go to the Grand Canyon and walk up there to all of those people that are standing close to the edge and they’re admiring the vista and they’re admiring the Grand Canyon. Walk up to all of those people who are standing there and get out in front of them and turn around and face them.

And say to them, Look how awesome I am. And they’re going to look at you like you’re a fool.

Because you are. Because I hate to tell you, nobody goes to the Grand Canyon to see you. But sometimes that’s how we get bigger in our eyes. And God gets smaller. You ever been to the zoo? Nobody goes to the zoo to see the dochin exhibit. You know dochshans, the little wiener dogs. Nobody goes to the zoo and walks around and asks somebody, where’s the dochin exhibit? We don’t do that. Nobody goes to the zoo to see the dochens. We go to the zoo to see lions and tigers and bears. Why? Because lions and tigers and bears will rip your face off. That’s why. That’s what we want to see. But we don’t want to get too close. And so they put them at a distance from us.

And there’s a moat, or there’s some kind of fencing. There’s some kind of way they cannot get to us. And yet we are attracted to them. But they’re dangerous. Like God. You know, I think a lot of people come to a Sunday assembly. I think a lot of people come to a Sunday assembly to see the dochin exhibit. Because they’re God’s pretty small. That’s not the God of Moses. Not at all. Because Moses came to understand that he served a dangerous holy God. The same God who put a ball of fire in the sky that is so bright that if you look at it, you will lose your vision. God did that. And it’s that same God who seeks to light a fire in his people.

2. Fire Is Intimate, So Is the Love of God

What is it we sing? Light the fire in my heart today. Secondly, write this down. Like fire is intimate. Like fire is intimate, so is the love of God. Like fire is intimate, so is the love of God. You ever sit around a campfire? When there is a campfire, there’s something about a campfire that draws you closer, that draws you in. There’s a sense of coziness. There’s a sense of warmth and intimacy. When I think campfire, I think friends and s’mores. You know. And yet at the same time that fire warms you and saves you from the cold. It can also kill you. So here’s the problem. God is holy. God’s not going to turn down the heat of his holiness to accommodate you or me.

God is not going to make his fire of holiness any less hot. So, how is this going to work? As I want to get closer to him and have a relationship with him. How is this? How is this possibly going to happen? Because he’s not going to change himself. He is who he is. I am who I am. So how’s this going to work? Well, instead of changing him, he changes me. Because he loves me. And he has made a way for me to come to him without getting burned. I want you to see between the lines of verse 7 and verse 8. The Lord said to Moses, I have seen the affliction of my people. Who are in Egypt, and I’ve given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings.

Now look at verse 8. So I have come down to deliver them. Do you understand the ultimate God coming down for deliverance? The ultimate didn’t happen here. The ultimate would happen years later. When Jesus came.

And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. The word is tabernacle or tented. He pitched his tent with us. He came down to deliver us. And the same God who said to Moses, you tell them I am who I am, is used by Jesus, who said, I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life. And so the only way, the only way you can come to the fire of God’s holiness and not get burned is through him. He said, No one comes to the Father but by me. And so God has made a way. Because he took death for us. He walked into the fire for us. He died on the cross for us. And why? 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 21.

So that you can become the righteousness of God in Him. In Him. And why would He do that? 316. Because He so loved the world. And by world He means you and me. Us. So you’ve got to understand, God takes sin seriously, very seriously. So seriously that when you come to the fire of His presence, when you come to the fire of His holiness, the only way you can come is through Him. Jesus is the I am of forgiveness. He is the I am of holy purifying. And the point is, when you let Him purify you, when you let Him forgive you, then He sets you on fire. And when that happens, you become the bush that doesn’t burn up. Not because of you, but because of Him.

What does the song say? Light the fire in my heart today. The problem is because of all of the stuff we’ve been facing the last year. We’ve kind of gone to Pilate like. You know?

3. Fire Fuels Motion, So Is the Power of God

The fire has kind of dwindled down. In some places, and some people it’s gone out. Which brings me to my final point. Just like fire fuels motion, so is the power of God. Just like fire fuels motion, so is the power of God. Your car doesn’t move without power. It’s impossible. And so there is a combination of fuel and the spark of a plug. And when you take combustible fuel and the spark of the plug, you know what happens? There is explosion motion. And the car moves. And it was the same with Moses. Moses is like a lot of us. He’s kind of running on empty. Until God filled his tank and gave him a mission and gave him a purpose and gave him a spark of motion.

And that’s why when you begin to read in verse 10, verse 11, verse 12, and verse 13, when God entertains his questions, until finally you get down to verse 16. There’s one word, two letters. Anybody see it in verse 16? One word, two letters? Huh? Anybody see it? What is it? What? Go. Go. Doesn’t Jesus tell us to do the same? Go, make disciples of all nations. You see, nothing explodes without being lit. God lit him up. God lit Moses up. And he’ll light you up. Because once you see the fire of God’s holiness, and once you are consumed with the fire of God’s love, then you can find a purpose, his purpose, and it will explode in your heart. Luke chapter 24, two men are walking along the road.

And they’re talking about the events of the preceding days in Jerusalem and Jesus, how Jesus of Nazareth had been crucified, and they’re talking with a stranger who seemed oblivious, and so they’re having this conversation with him. And it was Jesus Himself. It was the resurrected Lord, but the text says they were, they didn’t recognize him. And then after they did, and after he had explained the scriptures to them, remember what they said? Were not our hearts burning within us? When he explained those scriptures. Explosion motion. In Acts chapter 2, the day of Pentecost, the apostles, tongues as a fire came down upon them. And they spoke in other tongues. They spoke in other languages as the Spirit was giving them utterance. God lit them up. And those men not only spoke that day, but they took the message to the whole world and they turned the world upside down.

Explosion motion. God doesn’t say come sit. God says go. Go. Remember football. Anybody remember when they played football, you know?

Everybody, you know, you go to a football game, and before they run the play, they all huddle. The offensive gets together and they huddle up, huddle up. And they talk about we’re going to run this play. And so then they break and they go and they run the play. We’re kind of like that. Assembly time is huddle up, huddle up. But sometimes we forget to go run any place. And I don’t think Christianity is about huddling up. As if that’s the end all of it all. We huddle up to do exactly what God told Moses to do. We huddle up to do exactly what the Lord told the apostles to do. Go. But you can’t go. You can’t get motion without fuel, without a spark of fire.

Because that’s what produces the explosion motion. And sometimes I think we forget that. Okay, what have we said? What time am I supposed to quit?

Conclusion

Nine minutes? Oh. Oh, wow, I don’t have that much stuff. I don’t talk that long. Sorry. What have we said so far? This is it. Do you know that God hadn’t just saved you from something? When we talk about salvation and redemption, that’s usually what we’re talking about. God has saved me from something. God has saved me from my sins. Well, absolutely He has. But God hasn’t just saved you from something. God has saved you to something. You see, we are the church of the living God. We’re supposed to be the people God has made holy. And what we’ve said this morning is holiness is attractive, but it is also dangerous. We’re supposed to be a group of people on fire. Are we on fire? Do you understand, ladies and gentlemen?

Where there is no fire, there’s no mission. And where there is no mission, there’s no church. And all that is left is a group of people who get together on a Sunday morning and they sing about a fire they wish they had. But they don’t. We need to pray. God, light us up.

Light us up so we don’t burn up. Light us up so we can go set the world on fire as you read in the book of Acts. This is not about Fahrenheit 451. Let’s go burn a bunch of books. This is about a book that ought to burn us up. Big difference. Big difference. You see, we’re not here to be entertained. We’re not here to go through life with our head in a screen. We’re not here to go through life watching every movie we can and listening to all the music we can and just entertainment, entertainment, entertainment. That’s not what life’s about. We have mission. We have purpose. Go, he says.

Because he has a lot to tell us. I hope something has been said this morning that has been helpful, that has been challenging, that has been encouraging. Because, ladies and gentlemen, life is short. It’s real short. What are you doing to make a difference with the life that you have? Light the fire in my heart today. Let’s pray together. Father, we thankful, so thankful for the blessings that you have provided us this morning. Here we are as your people gathered in Orlando, Florida. And Father, we have all come through a very difficult time of just weeks turning into months and months now into over a year where we’ve struggled in so many ways. We pray, Father, today will be a day that we can reignite our purpose.

Be reminded again of your promises. And may we reach to help one another get through all of this, but not take our eyes off of the lost. You have blessed us in so many ways, and you have brought us through this. And we pray that you will continue to be with us and that you will continue to strengthen us. Give us courage. Give us faith. Help make us the kind of people you want us to be. Be with this church family at South Bumby. And Father, we pray that as the days move ahead, that they will continue to work, that they will continue to go, that they will continue to grow. Use every member here. Use every family here in some way to make that happen.

And help us, Father, to turn up the light of your word. Help us to be a people on fire for your cause. Strengthen us in the faith of your Son. And thank you, Father, for blessing us and bringing us to this point. Forgive us of our sins. Keep us in your care, and may we glorify your name in all that we do. For in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. Y’all can visit because I’m done.