Isaiah 6:1-8 (KJV)
“[1] In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple. [2] Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. [3] And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory. [4] And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. [5] Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. [6] Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: [7] And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. [8] Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.”
In this passage, God showed Isaiah a vision — a vision with a wonderful message. A message not just for Isaiah, but also for every Christian. What is this message? It is the revelation of our true estate — the kind of persons we are to be. And we pray the mercy of God to indeed bring us into the experience of such glorious kind of persons. Amen!
The first sentence of the vision says: “… I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple”. This sentence tells us that the venue of the vision is the temple, and that’s a very important point for understanding the vision and its message. What’s the temple? 1 Corinthians 3:16 says:
“Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?”
And 2 Corinthians 6:16 says:
“And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.”
From these two passages, we (Christians) are the temple of God (as individuals and as a church). 1 Timothy 3:15 says:
“But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.”
The church is the house of God (the temple of God). As such, the vision Isaiah saw about the temple, with the Lord and the seraphims in it, is a vision about the church and the individuals that make up the church. With this understanding, we can then ask:
Who are the seraphims in the Church?
They are a revelation of what each Christian should be, which is why when Isaiah saw them, and saw the effect of their speaking (how that the post of the door moved and the house was full of smoke when one spoke) he said, in verse 5, “… Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips”. He said this because he realized how far behind he was compared to the glory of the seraphims.
Now if the possibility of him to become a seraphim did not exist, then there would have been no basis for comparison, or for him to feel bad; after all, he was a prophet of high standing. It is like a lion and a dog. No matter how excellent the lion is, it would not make sense for the dog to compare the lion to himself, because there is no way a dog can ever mature into a lion. But a young cub can look at the mane of a mature lion and wonder and lament about how much growth he still has to grow to get to that level. Such was the case for Isaiah, which is why he said “… I am a man of unclean lips …” because he saw the glory of the clean lips of the seraphims (in terms of the kind of power they communicated).
The Hebrew word translated to English as “seraphim” is “saw-rawf” and it means “a burning symbolic creature”. This is important to note. A seraphim is a symbolic creature! What does that mean? It means whereas there are animals that are used as symbols to pass a message across, like: Lamb (for Jesus), sheep (for true Christians), Lion of Judah (for Jesus), roaming roaring lion (for satan), serpent (for satan), and many more (bear, leopard, ram, horse, eagle, etc), in the case of the message the seraphims represent, there was no animal that could be used to sufficiently pass the message across, so a symbolic six-winged creature was used.
They are the same ones referred to as the living creatures in Revelation 4:8, saying the same thing they said in Isaiah’s visions: “ holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty …”. But in Revelation 5:8-10, the identity of the living creatures is much clearer. It says:
“[8] Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. [9] And they sang a new song, saying: "You are worthy to take the scroll, And to open its seals; For You were slain, And have redeemed us to God by Your blood Out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, [10] And have made us kings and priests to our God; And we shall reign on the earth."
Here, in verses 9 and 10, the living creatures say that Christ has redeemed them by His blood out of every tribe, tongue, people and nation, and made them kings and priests of God who shall reign on the earth. And from Revelation 1:6 and 1 Peter 2:9, it is clear that being kings and priests is the hope (or destiny) of every Christian. Meaning, the living creatures (or the seraphims) are actually symbolic creatures used by God to show us what we are destined to be.
In simple terms, the seraphims represent a stature of spiritual maturity where all the seven spirits of God are operational in a believer’s life. The six wings of the seraphims (which together with the head of the seraphim make seven) are synonymous to the six branches of the candlestick (which together with the center branch make seven). Same message, different symbols.
If you imagine a seraphim spreading out his six wings and raising them up to God, what you get visually is like the candlestick with its six branches spread upward. But Revelation 4:5 has clearly defined for us that the seven lamps of the Jewish candlestick represent the seven spirits of God; which means, the seraphims represent the seven spirits of God: each wing (like each branch of the candlestick) represents one of the seven spirits of God.
Isaiah 11:2 lists the seven spirits of God as: the Spirit of the Lord, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, and the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. With this, we can understand that a seraphim is one in whom the Spirit of the Lord (the Holy Spirit) is, and then as a result, the three pairs of virtues are also manifest in the person: wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
Each of these six virtues is represented by a wing. Why? Because physically speaking, a wing is the means by which a bird rides on the motions of the wind to ascend to higher heights. Indeed, each of these virtues are expressions of the move of the Holy Spirit and the ability of a Christian to flow in any of these moves of the Spirit is what is represented as a wing. The greater a wing, the greater the ability of the believer to flow with the Holy Spirit in that particular virtue (e.g., wisdom, or might, etc).
Such is the life of a seraphim. It is simply the picture of a believer filled with the Holy Spirit, living not by His own will but as by the Spirit of the Lord, and then also expressing His wisdom and understanding, counsel and might, knowledge and the fear of the Lord to an excellent measure. It is the new creation man; a reality made possible by the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is what Isaiah saw in the Old Testament, and greatly desired to experience such a life (which is far beyond His Old Testament prophetic experiences). But now it is possible for us to grow into such life. It is those who mature to such level that will be revealed to all creature as the sons of God (Romans 8:16-19).
How do we mature to express the seven spirits of God?
Simple! As a baby is designed by God to grow into a mature adult, so also every believer is designed by God to grow into an expressor of the seven spirits of God. And like the baby grows by faithfully drinking milk and later eating mature food, so also every Christian should eat the Word of God daily and digest it through sincere prayers. And like the nutrients in the milk and food make the baby grow to an adult, so also the power of the Spirit of God in the Word of God will make you grow into a mature son of God — a burning Seraphim with six wings!
Prayer for today:
O Lord, deliver me from uncleanness. Let my thoughts, words and actions be pure in Your sight. Let me always hunger for Your word and diligently eat it so that I can grow. O Lord, let Your mercy help me to arrive at this destiny of living on earth as a burning seraphim in Your temple, that I might be a light bearer to my brethren and to the world, and that I might be able to soar high in the seven dimensions of the Spirit (in the will of the Lord, in wisdom, in understanding, in counsel, in might, in knowledge, and in the fear of the Lord). Amen!
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