Prepare the sacrifice and God will release His fire

We are to be the living sacrifices that God pours His fire on. The people in the Old Testament prepared a sacrifice of stones and firewood. It’s our job to prepare the material on which God can release the fire. 
“the preparation of the heart belongs to man” Pr 16:1. You prepare room for your heart to have more of God by taking more time in His presence.

This sacrifice will not go unnoticed and He will release His fire on the sacrifice to consume it. The fire takes over the sacrifice. The sacrifice was made of stones in the Old Testament and we are the living stones:

” you also, LIKE LIVING STONES, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering SPIRITUAL SACRIFICES acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” 1 Peter 2:5

There was also wood as the other material in the burnt offering sacrifices. It symbolizes the material, the fuel that can keep the fire burning – that fuel is our spiritual hunger. It also reflects the grace of God who died on a tree to bring the fire of God in our lives. The Bible says that ‘where there is no wood, the fire goes out’ Proverbs 26:20 – so we need God’s grace mixed with our own spiritual hunger in our heart to enable us to keep the fire going.

The burnt offering is an offering offered for a renewal of relationship with God – according to scholarly resources – https://www.gotquestions.org/burnt-offering.html . We get renewed in our relationship with God as we prepare the sacrifice, wait for God to release His fire on it and then sit regularly in that fire so that our heart warms up and softens towards God.

The Bible says:
” I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a LIVING SACRIFICE, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” Romans 12:1-2

In other words, we are to daily, lay ourselves on God’s altar, surrender ourselves unconditionally to whatever the fire wants to consume in us or how it wants to burn through us and let Him set us on fire!

Jesus said: 
“I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” Luke 12:49, 
Just look at this verses in the New Living Translation:
“I have come to set the world on fire, and I wish it were already burning! ” – WOW

He longs for the fire of our love for Him and for us to be so on fire for Him that we become empowered to reach the world He died for.

John the Baptist also said about Him:
” He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit AND WITH FIRE” Matthew 3:11

He is a consuming fire, and the more we sit by the fire, the warmer and softer we become on the inside, the more malleable, moldable and willing to yield we become.

In Revelation 2:4-5 He said that He wishes us to be either hot or cold, He will otherwise vomit us out of His mouth – what a violent reaction which says: I can’t stand this, this is more than I can take, it makes Me sick, it is nauseating. You vomit something when the body is compelled to expel it. God feels compelled to keep us at distance when we are lukewarm..

In other words, He is an all or nothing kind of God. Either He has all of our heart or He hasn’t. Either we love Him or we don’t. He said that He who keeps My commandments is he who loves Me. (John 14:21) It is not those who sometimes keep His commandments and sometimes live for themselves.

He seems to say He would prefer us cold rather than lukewarm, which is a HUGE statement. Better not to believe in Him at all than to be half-hearted about it. That is a strong statement. Of course, God is patient with us and gives us time to change, but when it comes to us putting Him first, to our love relationship with God, He seems to be less patient than with other things, because He said ‘If you do not repent, I will come QUICKLY and take the lampstand from among you”. This urgency of His to act reflects how strongly He feels about us not making our relationship with Him our top priority, above service for Him.

If we are half hearted we can ask Him to ‘unite our heart to fear His name” Ps 86:11 and we can pray like David prayed: “Give my son Solomon a loyal heart to keep Your commandments and Your testimonies and Your statutes” (1 Chr. 29:19).

To be hot means to have our first love back. 
I wrote 2 articles on ‘How to come back to your first love’ and a practical exercise people can do to recover it called ‘First Love Recovery Exercise’. The links are below. If you feel you need renewal in this area, I encourage you to make it a priority to read them and apply them so you can rectify your condition which Jesus feels so strongly about.

Come back to your first love article

First love recovery exercise article