Ezekiel saw that the cloud which overshadowed him was covered with fire flashing continually. This also is a matter which corresponds to our spiritual experience. When the stormy wind comes from the Lord and the overshadowing presence of the Lord remains, we have the sense that something within us is shining, searching, and burning. Under such a shining, enlightening, searching, and burning, we may realize that we are wrong in certain things. For example, we may realize that our attitude toward a particular brother is wrong. Under the shining and searching of the Lord’s presence, we are exposed, and we condemn ourselves and confess our shortcomings. Then the searching fire will burn away the negative things within us.
The fire seen by Ezekiel signifies God’s burning and sanctifying power. Everything that does not match God’s holy nature and disposition must be burned away. Only what matches His holiness can pass through His holy fire. This can be confirmed by our spiritual experience. The Holy Spirit comes to convict people regarding sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). Whenever the Holy Spirit touches us and causes us to confess our sins and pray, we will sense the need to be sanctified and to have all the corruption purged out of our being. We will realize that anything that does not match the holiness of God must be burned away. If someone claims to have been visited by God but has no feeling concerning his sins and unholiness, that person has not truly been touched by the Spirit of God. When God visits a person, His holy fire will come to consume the negative things in him. This burning fire also causes us to be enlightened. The more the fire of the Holy Spirit burns in us, the more we will be purified and enlightened.
If we experience the Lord in this way, there will be no need for others to tell us that we are wrong in certain matters or that our attitude toward a particular brother is wrong. If someone tries to correct us, we might be offended. But even if we would receive a word of correction and then try to improve ourselves, this would not mean anything as far as the inner life is concerned. We need to be under the shining and the searching of the Lord’s presence. The more we are under this shining, the more we will be willing to say, “Lord Jesus, burn me! I am not good for anything except to be burned. O Lord, burn away my disposition. Burn away my intentions, my self-aim, my motives, and my goals.” This is a genuine experience of the inner life, not a mere teaching.
After ministering the Word to the Lord’s people for many years, I have learned that mere teaching does not accomplish anything. We all need the blowing of the wind, the overshadowing of the Lord’s presence, and the searching and burning of this fire. Our God is a consuming fire (Deut. 4:24; Heb. 12:29). The wind, the cloud, and the fire are all the Lord Himself. When He comes, He comes as the stormy wind. When He remains with us, He stays as the cloud. When He searches and burns us, He searches and burns as the consuming fire. No one can experience the Lord as the blowing wind, as the covering cloud, and as the burning, consuming fire without undergoing a real change and transformation. We all need transformation by fire. We all need to be transformed by being burned.
Our God, the Lord Jesus, is not only the living water but also the consuming fire. Many Christians appreciate Ezekiel 47 because this chapter speaks of the flowing river. We need to realize that the flowing river is not the first thing in Ezekiel. Rather, the river comes after the fire. The fire is in chapter one, and the river is in chapter forty-seven. The fire always comes first. The source of the fire is the blowing wind with the covering cloud. From this we see that the fire does not come to us directly. God comes to us as the blowing wind and stays with us as the covering cloud. Under His covering we are exposed by His shining. As we are under His shining, we should confess our need for His burning and then pray for Him to burn away our self, our old nature, our disposition, our worldliness, and our attitudes, goals, aims, motives, and intentions. We all need to be burned by the Lord in this way. One such burning is better than a thousand teachings.