The Price Behind the Anointing

Step 4. The First Firing

Almost immediately, the Lord takes you out of the
wilderness and places you in a large room with other dried vessels. At
first you are relieved, but as fire starts to come through the
floorboards and the top of the ceiling, you panic.

The Lord has moved you from the shelf to the kiln, from
the wilderness to His consuming fire. You can sense the heat. You can
feel the relentless blaze. Perspiring yourself, you suddenly look over
at the sweaty people next to you and realize you don’t even like them!

The Lord never fires just one vessel at a time. He takes
a church, a family or a group of friends and sets them on fire to
expose everyone’s hearts. In the intense heat, all the impurities of
the soul come to the surface. Resentment, bitterness, anger and greed
are revealed.

As the fire gets hotter, the pain increases. You cry out,
“Lord! Everything in my life is dying!” Relationships with family and
friends become strained, you experience persecution at work, and you
can’t get along with the people at church.

“God, if you love me, You’ll turn off the heat!” you
complain. But the fire continues to blaze even hotter. Finally, the
doors open, and the Lord removes the clay vessels and places them back
on the shelves.

Now you’re actually happy to be in a hidden place.
You decide to sit in the back of the church and not give prophecies or
be a part of the prayer team anymore. Oh, yes, you still raise your
hands and occasionally pray for people, but you’ve become lukewarm.
When the Holy Spirit stirs your heart to give a word, you say, “No! If
I give a word, others will judge me. No, Lord, find someone else.”

For a while, God tolerates your pulling back. Then He
begins to nudge your spirit. He says: “Are you willing to settle for
this, or do you want more of Me? Do you want to become My anointed
bride?”

Step 5. The Glazing Room

Something deep inside you stirs—that first call, that
sense of destiny you felt as a new believer. “Lord,” you cry, “I don’t
want to just sit in the back pew and die. You made me to be a lover of
your people and to go out and find broken vessels and bring them to the
Potter’s house.

“I know it won’t be easy,” you continue. “I know I will
pay an incredible price for the anointing I will carry for You. But,
Lord, I want to become Your bride.”

So the Lord takes you into a huge glazing room filled
with tables. Angels are moving pitchers from one table to another and
placing them with cups on other tables in preparation for the high
firing. The soft sound of weeping is heard as vessels that have been
together all their lives are being separated.

God is sovereignly moving His different vessels to
prepare them for His Great Commission. Some will be staying at home
while others will be going to different cities and nations. The angels
continue to carefully pour, paint and brush glazes onto each vessel
before carrying them into a large kiln.

Step 6. The Second Firing

With raging intensity, the second fire starts to burn
through the kiln. Quickly you move from a time of separation into a
time of death. There are impurities within each clay vessel that only
the fire can purge.

The Lord and His angels shut down the dampers on the
kiln, cutting off the flow of oxygen and filling the kiln with carbon
dioxide. Black soot along with heavy smoke and flames consumes every
vessel in the kiln as it becomes a black fire, your personal Gethsemane.

Abandonment, isolation and death itself are all around
you. The fire is so intense that you can’t hear or see the dear friends
who have been your comforters and intercessors for so many years.
Everyone you love seems to leave you as you die in this blazing inferno.

You say: “Lord, the fire! I’m dying in the midst of it! Everything I’ve built and loved my whole life is being consumed!”

Your heart breaks as your reputation and your walk with
the Lord are condemned. Competition, position, jealousy and pride are
driven out of your life by the purifying flames.

You feel as if you’re going to explode under the
ever-increasing pressure. The Lord tenderly explains, “My child, in the
midst of the black fire, a mystery takes place. Brilliant color is
pushed deep into the body of the clay vessel.

“My mysteries and My revelations are revealed in the
tremendous pressure of the high glory fire. This is a hidden time when
the most beautiful colors are formed in the earthenware vessel. The
richness and depth of color come from the darkest hours of agony and
grief, just as diamonds, rubies, and emeralds come from hot fires
inside the earth. In the midst of this second firing, My glory is being
released into the depths of who you are.”

Step 7. The Glory Fire

At the moment when you just know you’re going to
die, the Lord opens all the dampers. Carbon and black soot escape,
oxygen pours in, and the fire starts to burn clean, white and fresh.
The resurrection light of the Lord and His white transparent glory fire
fill the kiln. Everything seems new because you are no longer looking
through the haze of ego, pride or religiousness. You start to see with
clarity in the Spirit.

Suddenly, in the midst of the white, transparent, glory
fire, you hear the voice of the Lord and see all the angels as well as
the Lord Himself. Fresh anointings and impartations are poured out, and
fresh hot commissions and renewed visions are etched into the hearts of
men.

The Lord begins to place His chosen mantles on various
clay vessels. He takes coals of fire and places them on stammering lips
to ignite prophetic giftings that were declared over these vessels when
they were on the Potter’s wheel. Shaking and crying, healing and
deliverance, deep repentance and intercession fill the kiln as hungry
hearts cry out for more of God.

They’ve been through a time of appointing, a time of
testing, a time of separation and a time of death, but in this high
fire they’ll go through a time of resurrection as they start to move in
the anointing with authority.

When the Lord walks through the kiln and sees Himself
reflected on each vessel as in a mirror, He turns off the kiln. With
great joy He announces, “Now that you reflect My glory, I can send you
out to all the world.” The Master Potter has perfected His work of art.

The late Jill Austin ministered the prophetic
word of the Lord at conferences and in churches around the world.