TRIAL BY FIRE
TRIAL BY FIRE
Sunday, September 30, 2018
Pastor Carolyn Sissom
This past week, we watched the process of a good man being tried by fire in a TRIAL BY FIRE. It was passionately painful to watch because I feel Brett Kavanaugh has been chosen by the LORD to be a Supreme Court Judge. As a spiritual warrior, there are different scenarios which the Spirit of God will move on me to pray with fervency.
The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
We must continue to pray for acceptable men and women who fear God and love our laws which are based on the Law of God in the New Covenant. The spirit of antichrist will always support a spirit of lawlessness.
Yet in my personal spiritual journey as well as my observation of those who God chooses for His Kingdom purposes, all are tested by fire.
1 Peter 1: 7-8: The genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen, you love.
We are in the end time war of good versus evil. God is allowing His possessing saints to be tested by fire. Jesus offered encouragement to the Smyrna church in Revelation. John spoke of those saints who were about to be tried in the fires of Satan’s last ditch rebellion. The end-time began in John’s day and continues today.
Revelation 1: 10-11: Do not fear any of those thing which you are about to suffer. Indeed, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested, and will have tribulation ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death.
This week we watched on our T.V. screens what appeared to me to be a viper attack: Isa. 59:5: They hatch vipers; eggs and weave the spider’s web. He who eats of their eggs dies, and from that which is crushed a viper breaks out.
The spirit of the viper attacked Brett Kavanaugh by stealth as well as it came from the heat of the fire to bite him (Acts 28:3). They are weaving a spider’s web.
The devil is still interested in raising up the forces of Hell against the sons of God in the testing of the saints. The saints will pass the test because the LORD knows before hand who will go through the fire because He says, He will bring us through.
Zech. 13:9: I will bring the one-third through the fire. I will refine them as silver is refined. I will test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name. I will answer them. I will say, “This is My people; and each one will say, ‘The LORD IS MY God.’
The 1/3 fraction became “This is My People” Each one of them will possess the Lord their God and declare the Lord is MY God.
Peter knew what the testing of one’s faith felt like. He was well acquainted with the venues which produced the trials that proved his mettle. His first failure was standing over a fire which became a fire to refine him. On the journey of his calling, he was threatened, imprisoned and castigated. Peter stood on the solid rock of his faith in Jesus. He understood that regardless of the source of persecution and trial, “Praise, honor, and glory” always went to Jesus whose life and death had “proved” Him faithful.
The refiner’s fire is a common bond between those who are in that 1/3 number. The sons of God all possess “like precious faith,” which is more to be desired that gold. God is still testing by fire His possessing saints, those who will say, “The LORD IS MY GOD.”
Job’s great testimony parallels the principle of provision and blessing for the fire tested crowd. He lost all. He endured the cynicism of his friends and the onslaught of the devil. His testimony was of faithfulness as he clung to God.
Job 23: 10-12: He knows the way that I take; when He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot has held fast to His steps. I have kept His way and not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandment of His lips. I have treasured the words of His mouth, more than my necessary food.
The book of Job chronicled the awful methods of trial by fire. It also chronicles a man’s determination to trust God regardless of the circumstances surrounding him. You have heard my testimony, that in the midst of a four-year trial by fire in my life, I was standing in my kitchen, and I heard, “Curse God and die.” I knew the Word and knew where that voice was coming from. I also knew I was in a battle for my life. Like Brett Kavanaugh, I had no idea how bad it would become before it was turned to my blessing. There is a reason Brett Kavanaugh is being allowed to go through this trial by fire. The LORD will require of Him a high calling. It might just be the overturning of Roe vs. Wade. This fire that is being burned in him, may be the fire of God to bring down the altar of Molech over this nation. It will produce a death of his carnal soul and produce a death which will cause him to become fearless.
Job’s years predated the gospel and the children of Israel. His tenacity, through false accusations, false religeon, and inner probes was based on faith alone. It produced a historic paradigm, “the patience of Job.” The trying of his faith gave him celebrity status. Job declared God was aware of his way. God knew him and knew his paths. He believed it was God who was testing him when in reality it was the devil. He prophesied by faith, I shall come forth as gold. He knew by holding on to God he would come through the pain and agony of the moment. He knew by faith, there was a better day ahead. He knew there would come a time when God would speak to Him. He was determined to stay the course. My foot held fast to His steps, was His confession. I have kept His way and not turned aside (Job. 23:11-12). I have not departed from the commandment of His lips. This would be a rare testimony in the 21st Century.
It is the Word that tests by fire. The testimony of Joseph in Psalm 105: 17-22:
Joseph – who was sold as a slave, they hurt his feet with fetters. He was laid in irons, until the time that his word came to pass, THE WORD OF THE LORD TESTED HIM. The king sent and released him. The ruler of the people let him go free. He made him lord of his house, and ruler of all his possessions, to bind his princes at his pleasure, and teach his elders wisdom.
Joseph’s feet bore a testimony which never faded from his mind, as “The word of the LORD tested him.”
The 1/3rd’s faithfulness will not go unrewarded. God did not say that He would spare them or rescue them. All of the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11 are involved in the 1/3rd. The world was not worthy of them.
There is a TRIAL BY FIRE going on in this 21st century. It is cruel. It is not fair. The testing is not from God, but from Satan. Yet, the LORD will use it to make all of us fire carriers to burn down the altars of Baal, the mouth of the beast, the mouth of the false prophet and the mouth of the dragon. Hear this church! Hear the sounds and see the signs of the times. Hear what is trooping to your door in increasing steadiness. Hear the voices of friends, relatives and confidants selling out the saints to preserve their station and advance their ambitions. The Word has formulated a test and every true saint has signed to take it.
Blow the trump at the time of the New Moon.
At the full moon, on our solemn feast day.
For this is a statute for Israel,
a law of the God of Jacob.
This He established in Joseph as a testimony,
When He went throughout the land of Egypt.
Where I heard a language I did not understand.
I removed his shoulder from the burden;
His hands were freed from the baskets.
You called in trouble, and I delivered you;
I answered you in the waters of Meribah
Selah.
Hear, O My people and I will admonish you!
O Israel, if you will listed to Me!
There shall be no foreign god among you;
Nor shall you worship any foreign god.
I am the LORD your God,
Who brought you out of the land of Egypt;
Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. (Psalm 81: 3-10).
Joseph was given as a testimony that God has an end to trials by fire. Joseph was promoted to the highest of offices when the Registrar of all Registrars took him by the hand. Church hear what the Spirit is saying to us through this Trial by Fire. I am the Lord your God…open your mouth wide, and I will fill it. After the fire, there is a procession to the throne.
It is better to be tested of God than to test God. Scripture has no favorites, and the sad story of a people who tried the Living God, reaped a harvest in their hearts. They were left to wander until death.
The Holy Spirit said; Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, and saw My works forty years. Therefore I was angry with that generation and said they always go astray in their heart. They have not known My ways. So I swore in My wrath, they shall not enter My rest. (Heb. 3: 7-11).
The blessing of Levi begins with testing and ends with promise, if passed. So every demand of the bible has its passage and its promise.
In the natural, a student may not advance to the next level until he or she has passed the exit test. At entrance, there may be given a test to discover a student’s areas of strength or weakness, but in the end there is only one test and it is the test for mastery. The church cannot continue to retake the first and never attain the latter.
Let your Thummim and your Urim be with Your holy one, whom You tested at Massah…bless his substance, LORD, and accept the work of his hands.
Strike the loins of those who rise against him, and of those who hate him, that they not rise again. (Deut. 33: 8, 11).
1 Peter 1: 6-9: In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need by, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen, you love, Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith---the salvation of your souls.
O Church, we have seen a severe trial by fire this past week. It was hurtful to all of us. Let us follow after Jesus and in His words through David who wrote, You have tested my heart…You, O God have tested us. You have refined us as silver is refined; and Isaiah: I have tested you in the furnace of affliction…Jeremiah: You have tested my heart toward you.
LORD JESUS HELP THIS NATION AS WE ARE BEING TESTED BY FIRE AS A NATION AND A PEOPLE LORD JESUS HELP BRETT KAVANAUGH go through the fire.
Carolyn Sissom, Pastor
Eastgate Ministries Church
Scripture from K.J.V. and N.K.J.V. I entered into the labors of Consumed By His Fire by Dr. C. R. Oliver, Zadok Publications, P. O. Box 971,Montgomery, TX. Comments and conclusions are my own and not meant to reflect the views of Dr. Oliver.