Blazing Fire's Encouraging Blog

Last weekend, we enjoyed another Snack & Testimony Night. After Brent led us through a gentle yet powerful time with soaking worship, we continued a great evening of snacks, fellowship & testimonies.  Sharing a testimony, whether with one person or a group, is really an exercise in remembering key moments in our lives (or for loved ones). A story helps us personally by freshening our recall of events that might fade over time. A story shared with others helps them to understand us better and to learn from our experiences.  In some Bible stories, people would stack or stand-up rocks to serve as a memorial to God’s goodness. For example, in Genesis 28 Jacob set up the rock he slept upon as a memorial to the powerful dream/vision God gave him. In Joshua 4, God instructed the Israelites to stack rocks from the Jordan River they had just crossed via His miracle. In the first example, Jacob erected a memorial based on God’s promises (even before any fulfillment). In the seco...

Worship is a gateway to encountering God’s presence and I believe that God wants to encounter us through worship corporately, in the mundane day to day tasks, and in the messiness of life.  God has reminded me of the beauty of bringing forth a “sacrifice of praise” when I am confronted with challenges in my life. A few weeks ago, I was feeling disappointed about a situation that I have been believing for breakthrough in but have not seen yet. I was struggling to believe that God is faithful, but I felt God pull me to the piano to worship Him and sing songs of thanksgiving. As I sang to Him, I heard God tell me that His faithfulness does not always look like the fulfilled promise or the breakthrough, but that His faithfulness often looks like Him holding my hand and choosing to stay committed to me through the pain and in the waiting. I cried and started truly believing that God is faithful as I continued to sing praises to Him. When we choose to worship Jesus in the middle of the s...

     I recently asked myself, what would it look like if I let grace continue its journey through me? We read in 2 Corinthians 8:1-15, the story of Paul writing to the Corinthian church to encourage them to follow through to give to the financial need of the brothers in the church at Jerusalem while also conveying of how passionately the church in Macedonia, who had completely nothing, gave without even thinking twice about it. I believe that this story is not talking only about money in the taking up of a collection amongst the churches, but far more about the heart in which the Macedonians gave out of having revelation of true grace.      When we think of generosity, we need to know that it is not a transaction, rather, it is a Trinitarian expression of grace. It begins in surrender to Jesus, flows from the will of the Father, and is completed through the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit. Before giving anything materially, the Macedonians gave their...

This year we've been on a great journey through 2nd Corinthians. It's been so good and revelatory.  As we arrived at chapter 6, verses 14 through 18, I had the honor of unpacking it a bit this last Saturday night. Just like always, my conclusion is that God really loves us and wants nothing to detour us from existing fully in His plan of love for us.  Even in this passage that contains one of the most misunderstood themes, "Don't be unequally yoked.", we see that our Father is wanting to protect us out of His love for us.  Let's check this out in the Mirror: 14 Faith-righteousness has nothing in common with the philosophies of karma and performance-based approval; they could never balance the scales or be evenly yoked together in any context. 15 There is no symphony between the value that Christ reveals in people and the worthlessness that Belial represents! Faith-righteousness and work-based righteousness are two opposites; they are conflicting systems that c...

by BILL HERNANDEZ In 2 Cor 6:1-10 it describes various hardships or challenges met with breakthroughs in spite of them. The church for many has been a place of difficulties, but through it all, by His Spirit, we overcome and move forward. In Isaiah 43:18-19 the Lord commands, “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”. Letting go of the past requires forgiveness and the power of His Spirit who dwells in us to help us. I go into depth on the topic in my sermon given June 28, 2025 where you can listen to the audio here: Whispers Of Love In moving on from the former things, old wine skins and previous challenges, I believe the Lord is cleaning house and moving us forward. The house is being swept and renewed back to pure love, pure motives, pure joy, selfless acts, generosity and releasing His presence on Earth as it is in heaven.   In th...

The Good News is so astoundingly good that every time I think I have a fairly good idea of what Christ has done for us, God reveals the next wave of wowness! I realize that’s not a word in the dictionary, but I use it to underscore how fresh revelation from God is above and beyond and altogether better than what we thought we knew.   This past week, I uncovered a gold nugget that God left for me to find—one that blew my mind away and sent my spirit into summersaults of ecstatic joy.   In 2 Corinthians 5:18-19, Paul brags on God and shares something profound that has happened to us in Christ:  “All this is from God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ and has given to us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their sins against them, and has entrusted to us the message of reconciliation.”  (MEV)   That’s four times Paul uses the word reconciliation in one long sentence....

When we come together with food and our stories of God's goodness....oh it's such a beautiful thing!  This last Saturday night was sweet sweet sweet with a very family-like atmosphere. I want to thank you all for bringing great snacks and for your willingness to share testimonies.  One thing that is interesting, and even fun, is to see is how the sharing becomes contagious. By this I'm referring to momentum that takes place when one person steps out. Just hearing the story of the person with the microphone stirs up the hearts in the room. It seems to pry loose, (if you will), what has been waiting to be shared by others. The testimonies, then, keep comin' and encouragement, excitement, life and even bravery fills the air around us.  Thus we have Revelation 19:10: "The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy." Very recently a young man was sharing with me how afraid he was by some current circumstances. It was clear that he was feeling overcome by them and...