Hebrews 12: 12-17: “Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees;

And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lamed be turned out of the way (injury becoming permanently crippling); but let it rather be healed.

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.”

Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up should trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;

Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.

For ye know that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.”

Now we are going to be going on into that passage, but I wanted to stop here for a little clarification.

He is telling us to strengthen, strengthen ourselves and others.

We are also to be careful of the path our feet wander in; we are to keep those paths straight.

Meaning it is our responsibility to avoid sin and evil and of course when it is sent as temptation from the enemy, God is faithful to help us every step of the way, strengthening us and delivering us from those pitfalls.

No one enjoys the fight against sin and our flesh, but it is our fight to fight.

It has always hurt my soul to hear of people having been witnessed to coming back with the response of asking why they should serve God, responding that He had done nothing for them.

He has done everything for us; we serve God because we want to serve God.

This is the issue, just as we are told of Esau, who sold his birthright for a bowl of soup!

A bowl of soup people, this was not a starving person, he was hungry, but he had a plentiful life.

It was a matter of convenience.

The porridge was already cooked, he was there, it was there and his inheritance was something in that moment that seemed so distant, so futuristic that it meant nothing to him.

You can read the story by clicking that link, and please notice that we are told in this passage that he regretted it.

He regretted that decision terribly, he cried and tried his best to figure out how to undo what he had done, some way to get the inheritance back once he realized the true worth of what he had just blown off.

But there was no going back, no way to ever regain what he had, in one moment thrown away.

I think we all make that mistake sometimes, putting off what should be done today.

Making light of God’s offer of salvation, sitting down, becoming comfortable and never fulfilling the calling on our life.

We are also warned that the fall of one will affect many. 

And of course, one person failing to do their job, hiding in the darkness rather than shining a light, being led by the flesh rather than the spirit, becoming more of the problem rather than being part of the solution.

This is what takes place when someone refuses the call of God and scoffs at the path he would have them go, and turn to their own paths, and end up crippled in the calling.

It’s kinda like your boss asking you to something and you scoff, roll your eyes, and say, “No way, I am not doing that!”

Only this boss has the power to send us to the belly of a whale, blind you three days on the road to Damascus, or commend you to hell if he so chooses.

Let’s get back to our passage, shall we?

“For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest.

And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more (they were terrified and asked not to hear his voice):

For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart:

And so terrible {frightening} was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake {tremble}:

But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,

To the general assembly and the church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect.

And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of the sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel.

See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall we not escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven:

Whose voice shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more, I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.

And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.

Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear:

For our God is a consuming fire.”

A little run down of the many reason that holiness unto God is required.

And what is holiness?

It is not a thought, a dress code, a congregation, a particular group.

Holiness is the state of our hearts and our souls dedicated to the honor, service, and reverence to God.

It is not even about us; it is about Him.

As we talked in our last posts concerning the need for unity and what we must realize is this, there are many good people who love the Lord in many denominations, as there are bad people in many denominations and truly one bad apple can negatively impact the view of the entire denomination.

Holiness is a state of heart and thankfully for us all God judges the heart not outward appearance.

He is a consuming fire and we as his children, his workers must present ourselves surrendered completely into his will. 

How could we ever, of our own will, become the sacrifice that we are to be, which is expected of us as our reasonable service to him and the kingdom?

Romans 12:1-3:

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.

For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; But to think soberly, according as God hath dealt (given) to every man (person) the measure of faith.”

We are workers together.

Our lives and hearts sacrificed to the Lord means foregoing our own thoughts, plans and desires, not that we are successful in that every single day.

But we are to strive for that because the more of our flesh we bring under submission to the Spirit, the closer we draw to God, and who does not want to be closer to God?

As we discussed earlier in this series, we can literally grieve his Spirit through our actions, words, and treatment of others.

Think of it kinda like this, if you had a friend whom you had not seen in years and were excited to reconnect and as soon as the person walks through your front door, your kid walks up to them and shouts, “Hey! You’re funny looking, and you smell bad too!  Why did Dad invite you here anyway!?

Your first thought is not going to be to take the little darling out for ice cream and a movie, you would be upset that your child treated your guest with such disrespect.

Same thing when we act like spoiled brats rather than children of the King.

We can grieve him many ways, through behaviors, words, actions and inactions, rebellion and disobedience.

Kinda like nixay on the ice cream, really think he’s going to open up heaven and pour down on us and send his fire and anointing through us?

Not picking on anyone, I have been Queen of the Bratitude on more than one occasion, and as long as we are on this earth we will need to overcome and often the most challenging force to overcome is the force of our own flesh.

But once we realize or are convicted in our hearts of the offense and we seek forgiveness he is as, as his word says, faithful to forgive.

He is not just waiting to throw us in to hell, just like you wouldn’t kick your kid to the curb for acting dreadful.

He wants us to be children on our best behavior, behavior which reflects our father.

To be a living sacrifice is to be surrendered for his use, a vessel for his fire, his power, whatever he so chooses.

We don’t tell him that we will gladly do one job but not the other, it is all about total submission.

We are to be living sacrifices and present ourselves before in His presence with the sacrifice of praise and prayer.

I want to give you a couple of verses to finish this off, hopefully you will see in these scriptures the importance of both the things.

The sacrifice of praise, praising God not just for what he does but just for who he is, for his goodness, his beauty, his majesty.

Hosea 14:2 ” Take with you words, and turn to the LORD: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so we will render the calves of our lips.”

Judges 5:2: ” Praise ye the LORD for the avenging of Israel, when the people willingly offered themselves.”

Psalms 100:4 ” Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.”

Prayer is powerful and you can’t see with the natural eye those prayers but in the spirit realm they ascend into the very throne of God.

Psalms 141:2: ” Let my prayer be set before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.”

1 Timothy 2:8: ” I will (would like) therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. (without anger and unbelief)”

Proverbs 15:8 ” The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the LORD: but the prayer of the righteous is his delight.”

Revelation 8: 3: “And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.”

Present ourselves as those living sacrifices, live in unity, praise him just for who he is, offer our heart in prayer confident through his word that he does hear them, we have that promise.

Isaiah 65:24: And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.”

Seek that today, seek a renewed relationship and witness the power of God in ways you never thought possible, as he said, while we are yet speaking, meaning before we even get through our request, he will have already answered.

Love & Peace, sorry for the older reposts that I ran lately, still working on getting all my phlogizo posts put up, you can check out more about that journey by visiting the side menu bar and select “WELCOME”

Sometimes it gets crazy, and it’s been quite a feat to get it all squared away, with still over one hundred and seventy posts marked private until I correct the links.

So, like I said always check the date at the bottom because the older ones may contain references to current events that are no longer current or good ol boys of ministry that thankfully are no longer in the picture!

Thanks for reading!  Φλογιζω NBJ 2025/ Rev. N Brown Johnson