In the Year that King Uzziah died...

I’m still in the first week at FLI (Focus Leadership Institute), and I’m beginning to see just a glimpse of how much I will be challenge in the next 4 months. But instead of feeling overwhelmed like I expected, I am unbelievably excited!

Sure, the syllabus is intense from the academic standpoint, but I can’t wait! A lot of the things I have already begun to study on my own or have been curious about.

The best part is that they are not just focusing on education, but transformation. They have warned all of us, it’s not going to be easy, but so worth it. FLI’s goal is to give us the tools to be better leaders, but also bring us to the place were we could gaze upon the face of God. For that is where transformation occurs.

Isaiah’s commission in Isaiah 6 is sort of their theme scripture for FLI, as well as their commission to us:

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on the throne, high and exulted, and the train of His robe filled the temple. Above Him were seraphs, each with six wings .... And they were calling to one another:

“Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of His glory.”

At the sound of their voices the door posts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.

“Woe is me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”

Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the alter. With it he touched my mouth and said “ See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin is atoned for.”

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here I am, send me!”

When you gaze upon the face of the Lord (spend time in His presence) You can’t help but be changed. You see yourself clearly, a sinner and a man totally unworthy to be in or near His holiness. Yet like Isaiah, He cleanses us. He not only atones for our sin, but takes our guilt away as well! So we can be free to serve Him, when we here the call. The only way to hear the Lord’s call though, is to be in His presence, attuned to and listening for Him.

I want to hear the call again, and say with everything I am “Here I am Lord, Send me!” I have no idea what type of transformation the next 4 months will hold for me, but I pray I am a willing vessel to His refining fire (or flaming coal!).

I’ve loved this passage for a while from a different point, because of a commentary that Oswald Chambers did on it. It’s just as challenging and Oswald looks at it this way:

“In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord…”

Our soul’s personal history with God is often an account of the death of our heroes. Over and over again God has to remove our friends [or ppl we are attached to], to put Himself in their place, and that is when we falter, fail, and become discouraged. …When the person died [left] who represented for me all that God was, did I give up on everything in life? Did I become ill or disheartened? Or did I do as Isaiah did and see the Lord?

He goes on to talk about how our vision of God is dependent on our character, and that determines whether or not truth can be revealed to us. Before we can say “I saw the Lord…” There must be a transformation in us to rid us of our personal biases so we can truly see the Lord. God has a way of taking those people/circumstances/distractions out of our life until we only see Him. It has happened to me on many different levels in the last year, and I want to see the Lord!

I am waiting for my Isaiah moment!