Finally, we will allude to the fire symbol. Gold is spoken of in
Scripture as tried in the fire. So of silver. "He" (Christ) "shall sit
as a refiner and purifier of silver." The precious metals will endure
the fire, but "dross and tin," as well as reprobate silver, will and
must be consumed. The baptism with the Holy Ghost and with fire is a
sin-consuming baptism. Fire is a great purifier. It makes the substance
which is subjected to it pure through and through, and not like
anything cleansed by water, pure as to its surface only. "Our God is a
consuming fire." Oh, beloved, let us give up to the fire all that is
for the fire. Let all depravity, all inbred sin, all tendency to depart
from God and yield to Satan, be burned up in this fiery baptism. May
God put upon all His pardoned children not the blood-mark only, but
the fire-mark also.
CHAPTER V.
ENTIRE SANCTIFICATION IN PROPHECY.
The Major Prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel. The twelve
prophetic books in the Old Testament following the book of Daniel are
called the Minor Prophets. In the writings of both classes we find many
allusions and predictions as to the entire sanctification of believers
in the gospel dispensation and under the reign of Messiah or Christ.
The sixth chapter of Isaiah is usually regarded as his call to the
prophetic office. Whether this be so or not, it records a very
wonderful experience of that grand man, and a remarkable type of the
baptism with the Holy Ghost as described in the book of Acts.
It is quite evident that Isaiah was a converted man before he wrote his
first chapter. In that he laments the sins of the Israelites and the
Jews, all of them God's chosen people, though now divided into the two
kingdoms and these often at variance, shows the utter futility of their
own efforts to regain the favor of God, by observances and sacrifices
and ceremonies, and then tells them how to be converted as plainly as
any gospel minister in our own day would be able to do. He shows them
that the way of salvation is by repentance and faith, and by trusting
to the unmerited mercy of God. Hear him: "Wash you, make you clean; put
away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;
learn to do well; seek judgment; relieve the oppressed; judge the
fatherless; plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together,
saith the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white
as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool."
Here are repentance and amendment of life and pardon, the washing away
of guilt and committed sins, symbolical of the New Testament washing of
regeneration, symbolical also of John's baptism of repentance unto the
remission of sins.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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