Number Fire

serephim ... this is an interesting word. It is a descriptive word of what they were doing which is simply who they were - burning. It would be like saying "Above him stood the Burning ..." It sounds odd ... there's a good name for a kid ... Burning. I bring this up, because who they are is the same thing as what they do ... there is no disconnect. I think about our name ... I am a Christian ... but is this simply a name or do I live it.

I rarely think of the Lord as a captain of an army and his angels as soldiers. The typical image of angels are so feminine or babylike ... but how many people do you know respond with fear to fem-baby-like persons? No, these are blazing warriors! Now that is something to fear. Think about it, if an infantry man came to your front door you would be afraid. "What's going on?" When a warrior shows up, you know that something is going down. Now, imagine a whole host of blazing warriors! And when they spoke the whole earth trembled. These were powerful blazing warriors.

"The whole earth is full of his glory!" (v. 3) ... Habakkuk echoes this verse when he writes "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea." (2:14) These two passages help me picture the glory of God filling the earth like water to the sea. How much water covers the sea? The water is ubiquitous and so is His glory. As I think about God's glory covering the earth like water, I think of the Deluge that covered the whole earth (Gen 6-9) ... as I looked at the Flood account there is one passage in 9:1 that hit me. God tells Noah to "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth." This harkens back to the Lord telling Adam and Eve to do likewise. They were to fill the earth. So we get these images of water covering the earth, people populating the earth, and the glory of the Lord filling the earth. What do these have in common? But wait there is more ... my buddy Daniel also speaks of the stone that crushed Neb's idol becoming a mountain that fills the whole earth (2:35). So what do these all have in common? This is like a Sesame Street drill. Water, People, Glory, Mountain ...

I'm not sure yet.