Dwelling with the Devouring Fire Text: Isaiah 33:14-16
Introduction: The Great Sorting
We live in an age that has done its level best to domesticate God. For modern man, God, if He exists at all, is a therapeutic assistant, a cosmic affirmation machine, or a vague spiritual force that is certainly not particular about morals. He is safe, tame, and manageable. He is, in short, nothing like the God of the Bible. The God of Scripture is a holy terror. He is, as our text says, a consuming fire, a continual burning. And the great question that every human being must face, whether they acknowledge it or not, is this: how can anyone possibly stand in His presence?
This is not a new question. Isaiah tells us that this very question caused panic in Zion. Notice who is in dread. It is not the pagans in a distant land; it is the "sinners in Zion." It is the godless who are part of the covenant community, the tares among the wheat, the pretenders in the pews. They had the form of religion, they had the temple, they had the sacrifices, but they did not have God. And when the reality of God's presence drew near, when the Assyrian threat was at the gates and the only hope was a divine intervention, a holy dread fell upon them. They suddenly realized that being delivered from the Assyrians might mean being delivered into the hands of a God who was far more terrifying.
Our text is about a great sorting. It presents two groups of people, two responses to the holiness of God, and two eternal destinies. The first group is seized with trembling, asking who can possibly survive this holy fire. The second group is described as the one who can. The passage lays out the character of the man who dwells with God, not because he is inherently fireproof, but because he has been made fit to live in the presence of the Holy One. This passage forces us to ask the ultimate question of assurance. It is not, "Am I a good person by some worldly standard?" but rather, "Can I live with God as He actually is?"
The Text
Sinners in Zion are in dread;
Trembling has seized the godless.
“Who among us can sojourn with the consuming fire?
Who among us can sojourn with continual burning?”
He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly;
He who rejects greedy gain of oppression,
And shakes his hands so that they hold no bribe;
He who stops his ears from hearing about bloodshed
And shuts his eyes from looking upon evil;
He will dwell on the heights,
His refuge will be the strongholds of the cliffs;
His bread will be given him,
His water will be sure.
(Isaiah 33:14-16 LSB)
The Terrifying Question (v. 14)
We begin with the panic that precipitates the question.
"Sinners in Zion are in dread; Trembling has seized the godless. 'Who among us can sojourn with the consuming fire? Who among us can sojourn with continual burning?'" (Isaiah 33:14)
The scene is Zion, the city of God, the place of covenant. And yet, it is filled with sinners and the godless. These are not people who are ignorant of God's law. They are covenant members who are in rebellion. They are hypocrites. They are the sort who honor God with their lips while their hearts are far from Him. And when God begins to move, when His presence becomes palpable, they are terrified. Why? Because they know, deep down, that they are flammable material in the presence of a holy fire.
The language here is stark. God is a "consuming fire" and a "continual burning." This is not a metaphor for divine anger management issues. It is a description of His absolute moral purity, His unapproachable holiness. As the author of Hebrews reminds us, "For our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:29). Fire purifies, but it also destroys. It provides warmth and light, but it also consumes everything that is combustible. The holiness of God is the central attribute from which all His other attributes flow. His justice is holy justice. His love is holy love. His wrath is holy wrath. To be in His presence is to be exposed to this unyielding, perfect purity.
The question they ask is the right question. "Who among us can sojourn...?" The word sojourn means to dwell as a temporary resident, but the context implies a lasting existence. How can we live, how can we survive, in the presence of such a God? This is the question that drove Luther to despair in the monastery. It is the question that must drive every man to his knees. The godless in Zion have been playing church. They have been treating God as a mascot or a cultural accessory. But now the lion is roaring, and they realize they are not in a petting zoo. Their trembling is the beginning of a right understanding of God. They have a problem, and it is an infinite one. Their sin has made them incompatible with the very presence of the God they claim to worship.
The Character of the Righteous Man (v. 15)
The text then pivots from the terrified question to the divine answer. The answer is not a philosophical proposition but a description of a person. Who can dwell with the fire? This man can.
"He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly; He who rejects greedy gain of oppression, And shakes his hands so that they hold no bribe; He who stops his ears from hearing about bloodshed And shuts his eyes from looking upon evil;" (Isaiah 33:15 LSB)
This is a portrait of genuine, lived-out righteousness. This is not a checklist for earning salvation. We must be absolutely clear on this. This is the fruit of salvation, not the root of it. This is what a man transformed by grace looks like. This is sanctification, the evidence of justification.
First, his walk and his talk are aligned with God's standard. "He who walks righteously and speaks uprightly." His conduct and his conversation are straight. There is no hypocrisy, no duplicity. His life is a seamless garment. He doesn't talk one way on Sunday and live another way on Monday. His words are true because his heart has been made true.
Second, his economic life is clean. "He who rejects greedy gain of oppression, And shakes his hands so that they hold no bribe." This man is not driven by mammon. He despises profit that comes from taking advantage of others. He hates injustice in the marketplace. The image of shaking his hands from a bribe is vivid. It is a physical act of repulsion. He wants nothing to do with corrupt money. He would rather be poor with a clean conscience than rich with a dirty one.
Third, he practices a holy censorship over his own heart and mind. "He who stops his ears from hearing about bloodshed And shuts his eyes from looking upon evil." This is a man who actively guards the gates of his soul. He does not entertain himself with violence and wickedness. He refuses to listen to gossip, slander, or plans of malice. He turns his eyes away from impurity and perversion. In our media-saturated age, this is a radical and necessary discipline. This man understands that what you feed your mind will shape your heart. He is not naive; he is deliberate. He is cultivating a holy affections by starving the unholy ones.
Now, we must read this and feel the weight of it. Who among us has done this perfectly? No one. This description is a mirror that shows us our own sin and drives us to Christ. This is a description of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the only one who has ever walked with perfect righteousness, spoken with perfect uprightness, and kept His heart perfectly pure. And the gospel is this: by faith, His perfect righteousness is credited to our account. We are declared righteous for His sake. But the story does not end there. God does not just declare us righteous; He makes us righteous. The Holy Spirit begins to work this very character into us. So this verse is both a picture of Christ for us and a pattern for us in Christ.
The Security of the Righteous Man (v. 16)
The one who is being conformed to this pattern, by grace, has a security that the sinners in Zion can only dream of.
"He will dwell on the heights, His refuge will be the strongholds of the cliffs; His bread will be given him, His water will be sure." (Isaiah 33:16 LSB)
Contrast this with the dread and trembling of the godless. The righteous man "will dwell on the heights." He is safe, secure, and elevated above the chaos and judgment below. His refuge is not in his own strength but in the "strongholds of the cliffs," a metaphor for God's unassailable protection. He is in the fortress of God's faithfulness.
And in this fortress, he is provided for. "His bread will be given him, His water will be sure." This is a promise of complete covenantal provision. In the midst of siege, famine, and turmoil, God will sustain His own. This points us to the ultimate provision we have in Christ. He is the Bread of Life, and He gives us the Living Water. The security described here is not just physical; it is profoundly spiritual. The man who dwells with the consuming fire does not get burned; he gets fed. He is not destroyed; he is defended. The very presence of God that is a terror to the wicked is a fortress to the righteous.
Conclusion: Fireproofed by Grace
So we return to the central question: "Who among us can sojourn with the consuming fire?" The hypocrite in Zion is terrified because he knows his entire religious performance is a sham, a structure of wood, hay, and stubble that will be incinerated in a moment. He has tried to approach a holy God on his own terms, with his own shoddy righteousness, and the prospect of meeting the real God fills him with dread.
The biblical answer is that no one can dwell with this fire in his own right. You cannot make yourself fireproof. You must be made fireproof. The only way to stand in the presence of the consuming fire is to be inhabited by one who is Himself that fire. The gospel is the astounding news that on the cross, the Lord Jesus Christ absorbed the full, consuming fire of God's holy wrath against our sin. He was consumed so that we would not have to be.
And when we, by faith, are united to Him, we are brought into the furnace of God's presence, not for destruction, but for purification. God the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of burning, takes up residence in us. He begins to burn away the dross of our sin. He begins to produce the very character described in verse 15. This is the basis of our assurance. Our assurance is not that we are perfect, but that God has begun a good work in us and will bring it to completion. We know we can dwell with the fire because we see the Spirit producing a hatred for sin and a love for righteousness in our lives. We see a growing desire to walk rightly, to speak truly, to work justly, and to pursue purity.
The fire of God's presence is not something to be trifled with. For the sinner in Zion, for the cultural Christian, for the man who wants a tame God, it is a terror. But for the one who has fled to Christ for refuge, that same fire is our safety. It is our fortress. It is the holy presence that secures us, provides for us, and purifies us, until the day we see Him face to face, and dwell with the continual burning forever, not in dread, but in delight.