What do you think of when you think of California? Earthquakes? Surfing? Hollywood & Celebrities? Those would all be correct, but what if I told you all I think about are it's Forest Fires? Sinister, I know! I'm about to make a cross country move to the state everyone thinks will suddenly fall off into the Pacific Ocean, but let me share with you how the Lord has been speaking to me about something I was terrified about, but now embrace............
Matthew 3:10 says, "Even now the ax of God's judgment is poised, ready to sever the roots of trees. Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit will be chopped down and thrown into the FIRE!." (Emphasis on fire, made by yours truly)
A few years ago, pre-pandemic, I found myself as a visitor at one of the local mega churches here in NYC. The pastor, also a visitor, was a guest speaker from California. He touched on the widespread devastation of all the forest fires that had been raging out of control at the time in SoCal. He explained, that miraculously, not all areas of the forest had been consumed by the raging flames. Even more miraculous, was when the vegetation started to regrow in the previously burned areas, that it's vegetation was noticeably MORE lush than the untouched/unburned sections of forest. How can that be? You're probably wondering.
Well, before I explain, let me also tell you about the time shortly after hearing that sermon when I was at the nail salon getting my routine manicure and they had the Food Network playing on the salon TV. The show in particular was "Pioneer Woman". Now, if you're not familiar with this program, it features a woman living somewhere in the middle of seemingly nowhere in the United States mid-west countryside. She's incredibly wealthy and she's also a really great chef. Hence the reason she landed a spot on the Food Network. Haha
Anyway, so in this episode in particular, she's cooking for her large family who are mostly farmers. On this featured day, they were actually having a BURN PARTY!
For a whole hour of this show, my mind was blown and I was so incredibly intrigued on how these very experienced and skilled farmers were placing fire boundaries around their fields in preparation for a very INTENTIONAL moment of lighting that baby up! Acres, upon acres in flames, on purpose. Come to find out, they do this annually and here's why.
“When there's so much residual junk from the world that we've accumulated over the years, sometimes we need a continual burning up of everything ungodly inside of us that doesn't belong there and hinders our progress. ”
The official term in the industry is called a "prescribed burn". It actually improves the health of the field. It gets rid of residual crops and helps the new seeds that will be planted to take better root, (More on this topic in my post, "Lessons from my Mom's Garden")
almost like a re-calibration of the soil. The thing about fire is that it has a way of testing purity while simultaneously creating it. Hopefully you see where I'm going with this. Just like the opening verse in Matthew 3, the Holy Spirit who also happens to be characterized as fire, performs this "prescribed burn" in the soil of our hearts, when we first come to Him. When there's so much residual junk from the world that we've accumulated over the years, sometimes we need a continual burning up of everything ungodly inside of us that doesn't belong there and hinders our progress. Very similar to the annual maintenance by the farmers of the world, we need our own individual internal field burning.
Stay tuned for more on this topic with part 2, that will be coming your way this week. Be on the lookout, and make sure you subscribe here for notification when it's hot off the keyboard. In the meantime, I encourage you to read Matthew 3 and John 15 for what the Word has to say about completely getting rid of anything that doesn't bear fruit in our lives.
Happy Healing!
Love,
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