Engaged By God To The Fire Of Intercession, Part One.

“You are to make an altar for burning incense; you are to make it of acacia wood. Its length is to be a foot and a half and its width a foot and a half; it will be square. Its height is to be three feet, with its horns of one piece with it. You are to overlay it with pure gold – its top, its four walls, and its horns – and make a surrounding border of gold for it. You are to make two gold rings for it under its border, on its two flanks; you are to make them on its two sides. The rings will be places for poles to carry it with. You are to make the poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. You are to put it in front of the curtain that is before the ark of the testimony (before the atonement lid that is over the testimony), where I will meet you. Aaron is to burn sweet incense on it morning by morning; when he attends to the lamps he is to burn incense. When Aaron sets up the lamps around sundown he is to burn incense on it; it is to be a regular incense offering before the Lord throughout your generations. You must not offer strange incense on it, nor burnt offering, nor meal offering, and you must not pour out a drink offering on it. Aaron is to make atonement on its horns once in the year with some of the blood of the sin offering for atonement; once in the year he is to make atonement on it throughout your generations. It is most holy to the Lord.” (Exodus 30:1-9)

Then Aaron’s sons, Nadab and Abihu, each took his fire pan and put fire in it, set incense on it, and presented strange fire[unauthorized fire; profane fire; unholy fire; a different kind of fire] before the Lord, which He had not commanded them to do. So fire went out from the presence of the Lord and consumed them so that they died before the Lord. Moses then said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord spoke: ‘Among the ones close to Me I will show myself holy, and in the presence of all the people I will be honored.’” So Aaron kept silent. (Leviticus 10:1-3)

It seems that Nadab and Abihu, similar to their aunt Miriam, made the mistake of attempting to step in to someone else’s job function without giving heed to the job description.

When God instructed Moses on the construction and ministry requirements of the tabernacle, He called Aaron by name as the High Priest who would bear responsibility for daily carrying the petitions of the people to God (Exodus 30:10). As Pastor Sam shared with us on Sunday, Aaron’s job description included intercession (speaking to God on behalf of the people) and interpretation (speaking to people on behalf of God).

Further, God was very specific concerning the way in which Aaron was to carry out his responsibility for intercessory prayer:

• The incense had to be burned on the altar that stood in front of the ark (Exodus 30:36);
• It had to be offered as part of the process of caring for the lamps (Exodus 30:7-8); and
• It had to be offered once in the morning and once as evening approached (Exodus 30:7-8).

Intercessory prayer is a special assignment. Perhaps this is why Nadab and Abihu were struck down by the LORD instantly, even as the offending fire was still in their fire pans:

• The use of fire pans instead of the altar (for burning the incense) was not authorized;
• The offering was not accompanied by the co-requisite attendance to the lamps; and
• The persons making the offering were not authorized to do so.

Leviticus 10:1 is clear about the root cause of the deaths of Nadab and Abihu: God had not commanded them to engage intercessory prayer. And this might be a challenging concept for some of us, especially in light of New Testament scripture that urges us to pray at all times, with all kinds of prayers… perhaps we are under the impression that “all kinds of prayers” implies “anything goes, and anyone can go.”

But intercessory prayer is not an “anything goes” venture. It is a job in which, as Pastor Sam warned us, “If you take your job for granted, you might hurt yourself”… even if you are sons of the High Priest.

Tomorrow, we’ll take a closer look at the ministry of intercession.