DAY 4 – Ignite

What an incredible encounter occurred on the Day of Pentecost when John’s prophetic words came to fruition in a powerful way!

The word baptize here means to ‘dip repeatedly, immerse or submerge’. What a wonderful picture John painted of what was going to happen when Jesus came on the scene — an immersion or submersion in the Holy Spirit and fire!

Fire actually helps to germinate seeds. One of its many functions is to revive life that cannot flourish without its intervention. When a fire spreads through a forest, it not only burns up everything that was dead and needed to be cleared away, but it also helps to germinate certain seeds that can only start to grow when scorched and subsequently awoken by flames. What a powerful image! When we are baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire, all sorts of dormant seeds can begin to germinate and new life and fruitfulness can begin. This is such a powerful concept.

What I love about John’s description of Jesus is not just his mention of the Holy Spirit, but also of fire. Fire is a symbol of passion. Passion has the power to motivate, inspire and keep us going when life gets challenging. Jesus personified passion during His life on Earth. Though He was a man, He had an intimate relationship and partnership with the Holy Spirit and was driven by passion to turn impossibilities into miracles. His final journey to Calvary is often referred to as ‘the passion of the cross’ because it was pure passion that propelled Him down the Via Dolorosa; passion to do the will of His Father, passion to set mankind free, and passionate love for us that enabled Him to push past the pain to win the greatest victory known to mankind.

The Bible says in the last days, the love of many will grow cold. As such, we desperately need a revival of passion. We need a revival of love. We need the Holy Spirit to come again and baptize us, fill us and ignite our hearts with passion and love so we can see what was promised in the book of Joel, outworked in our lives— that in the last day's God would pour out His spirit on all flesh.