Mark Hanby Ministries - Messages

In the beginning, before a blazing sun etched its amber face upon the dawn of creation, before solar sys-tems or celestial patterns were drawn in the heavens by the finger of God, before there was ever a planet or prototype of anything, God stepped out into the void of nothingness and created an innumerable, immeasurable host of angelic beings (see Job 38:4-7). The echoing cry of praise and wor-ship from this created choir of angels pierced the emptiness of non-creation and produced the very atmosphere of glory in which God created everything else. It is this same atmosphere that Isaiah enters into in the sixth chapter of his ministry record. ?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. 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. And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of His glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. 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. 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: 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. 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? (Is. 6:1-8). God?s Ultimate Desire Isaiah wasn?t given this incredible revelation of angelic activity simply to comfort him after the death of a leprous king. Nor is the sixth chapter of Isaiah merely a record of his call to the ministry of prophet; he has already prophesied for five chapters. God?s purpose for allowing Isaiah to enter into this vision of His throne was to impart to Isaiah and to us His ultimate desire?to fill the earth with His glory! It has always been the will of God for the whole earth to be full of His glory. In the fourteenth chapter of the Book of Numbers, we are told that the people of Israel refused to fulfill the purpose of their redemption. The Lord had brought them out of Egypt with great signs and wonders, but Israel refused to enter into the Promised Land! God was so angry about their obstinate hearts that He decided to utterly destroy all the Israelites except Moses and remake the nation through him. Moses interceded for the people, though, and God spared Israel. It was then that the Lord declared to Moses His heart: ?...I have pardoned according to thy word: but as truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord? (Num. 14:20-21). What Is ?Glory?? When we consider the concept of ?glory,? we usually think of something God has inherent in Himself, something He then gives or pours out on His people. Although it is true that the Lord is glorious in this sense, it is not the major idea or concept of glory in the Word of God! The biblical understanding of glory doesn?t refer much to the essence of Deity; nor does it portray ?glory? as something God rains down on us in our corporate gatherings. Glory is something that is made and given to God when we make manifest the greatness of God with the words of our mouth and the actions of our body. Glory is something we produce when we praise God to one another! (See Psalm 50:23 and Revelation 4:8-11.) When Isaiah saw the worship of the angelic host, he saw them giving glory to God. As these angelic beings saw the majesty of God, they could not whisper. They cried out from the depths of their beings?to one another?their praises of the Almighty! The atmosphere was altered by the praise between their faces, and ?the house was filled with smoke? (Is. 6:4). Smoke is a byproduct of something solid or tangible transforming into something gaseous or intangible. When we say that a house ?went up in smoke,? we mean that, as a result of a fire, a solid wood house burned up and transformed into a cloud of smoke. The tangible expression of the holiness of God between the angelic faces consumed the very substance of their beings. Their praises then became like smoke that filled the entire atmosphere of God?s throne room. They produced so much glory that the very ?posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried?! Between Their Faces Structural alignment occurs in the house of God through the creation of glory. When Moses fashioned a piece of furniture as a resting place for the glory of God, he simply followed the heavenly pattern that Isaiah saw generations later (Heb. 8:5). As a covering or lid for the Ark of the Covenant, Moses made a mercy seat with two cherubim??with their faces one to another? (Ex. 37:9). The mercy seat presents an earthly picture of what occurs in the heavenly realm. The cherubim were not placed back-to-back, side-to-side, or even back-to-face (as we sit in our church buildings and worship settings). God?s design is that ?their faces shall look one to another,? for God desired to meet with His people ?between the two cherubims? (Ex. 25:20-22). The only place where God will man-ifest His power is in an atmosphere of glory, created between the lips and faces of creatures who know their God. God created the angels first, even before creating the galaxies, so He would have an atmosphere of glory in which to manifest His power. Astronauts wear suits in outer space because humans can only exist in a certain atmosphere. God has chosen to manifest Himself only in an atmosphere of glory. Just as smoke is the result of fire consuming combustible material, glory is the product of thoughts of praise to God put into words between the lips of saints. This is why the Church is instructed to ?...be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves [meaning one to another] in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs...? (Eph. 5:18-19). Horizontal and Vertical The Church must produce glory if God is to show Himself in His fullness. If we only offer worship to God directly, then we only have a vertical dimension with Deity. But if the Church will also praise God to one another, we will fulfill the ?geometry of the cross? with our horizontal dimension of spiritual activity. When we develop both of these directional relationships with the Lord and His people, we will truly lift up Jesus, who said, ?And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me? (Jn. 12:32 ). As believers begin to share the goodness of God with one another, God moves in between their faces and they become the dwelling place of the Lord. When the Israelites finally did enter into the Promised Land, they had to conquer Jericho. All they did was get Jericho in between their faces and give a shout of praise to God, and the walls fell down! If we could ever overcome self and look and speak to one another about the majesty of the Almighty, then God would step in between our faces and no hindrance would ever exist between the people of God and His purpose and provision! When Isaiah saw the worship of the seraphim, he wanted to do the same thing, but he knew his innate impurity banned him from the celestial choir. Isaiah was unable to worship God because he had ?unclean lips.? Isaiah was unable to give God glory because his speech and the speech of his people were as unclean as the skin of Uzziah (2 Chron. 26:19-21). Then Isaiah?s dilemma was solved when his lips were purged by a coal taken from the altar of incense in the Holy Place. We must ask God to do for us what we cannot do ourselves: make us clean, righteous vessels for His service. Then we will be able to do what God asks of us. We Are the Vessels It is God who cleanses our lips, but we are the vessels called to fill the earth with the glory of God! The cry of the seraphim is, ?The whole earth is full of His glory.? In the King James Version, the verb ?is? is in italics because it is not in the original Hebrew. Thus the angels are not stating a fact; they are declaring a divine mandate! They are not saying the whole earth is now full of His glory; rather, the messengers of God are crying out that the whole earth must be, should be, and needs to be filled with His glory. Heaven is already filled with angelic voices producing an atmosphere of glory for God, but the earth has only small pockets of saints who truly understand and know the effect of their praise in the human arena of existence. The Kingdom prayer is that the Father?s will ?be done in earth, as it is in heaven? (Mt. 6:10). That is why God calls the prophet in Isaiah 6:8 and asks, ?Who will go for Us?? Like Isaiah, we must respond, ?Here am I; send me! We thank you so much four your continued love and support. Dr. Mark Hanby Order the message Filling the Earth With His Glory audio tape series.