Gideon's Sacrifice

Angel putting fire on Gideon's sacrifice.

<sup>Yesterday I was listening to the book of Judges, and as I listened to chapter 6, there was an event the Holy Spirit pointed out, and it really hit me.  As I said before, I am studying anointing, and from what I have found, the anointing is synonymous with consecration, because to be anointed is to be consecrated to the Lord.

You probably know the story.  Gideon was working in the wine press, the Angel of the Lord comes, calls Gideon (who was hiding and scared) a "mighty man of valor," and the following takes place:

17</sup> Then he said to Him, “If now I have found favor in Your sight, then show me a sign that it is You who talk with me. ¹⁸ Do not depart from here, I pray, until I come to You and bring out my offering and set it before You.”
And He said, “I will wait until you come back.”
¹⁹ So Gideon went in and prepared a young goat, and unleavened bread from an ephah of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and he put the broth in a pot; and he brought them out to Him under the terebinth tree and presented them. ²⁰ The Angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on this rock, and pour out the broth.” And he did so.
²¹ Then the Angel of the Lord put out the end of the staff that was in His hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened bread; and fire rose out of the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. And the Angel of the Lord departed out of his sight.

Gideon offered three things, broth, meat, and unleavened bread.

Let's get broth out of the way, because this isn't my focus.  The broth was poured out.  Pouring out drink offerings was common in the Old Testament, starting in Leviticus.  It has been suggested that God actually directed Gideon to pour the broth onto the rest of the sacrifice, as sort of a greater confirmation of the sign, like when Elijah poured water on his sacrifice at the confrontation of the prophets of Baal.  The real meat of this word God spoke to me though, is in the--

Meat

This is what God showed me about this passage.  Gideon offers meat, and unleavened bread:

Unleavened Bread

Symbolically, here is what those things represent.

The meat, represents the flesh.  We offer our flesh to God in lots of different ways.  Prayer, fasting, obedience, etc.  

Unleavened bread is representative of Christian life without yeast, without bad things. Albert Barnes Notes on the Bible says, - "By leaven the Hebrews metaphorically understood whatever had the power of corrupting, whether doctrine, or example, or anything else." In other words, it is symbolic of a consecrated life. A pure life.  (1 Corinthians 5:6)

All of these things were offered on the foundation of the Rock, the Lord Jesus.  All kinds of people live moral lives, and fast, and pray, and so on, yet if they these things are not done through Jesus, it is all for nothing.

What happened after this sacrifice was offered?   "...fire rose out of the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread."  The fire of God came, and consumed it.  Where did the fire come from?  It came from the rock.  

Do you want the fire of God to consume you?  Offer a consecrated life to Him, and it will come.