The Refiner’s Fire

I wish to begin our message with an illustration: There was a dedicated Christian woman who once visited a tourist attraction, which happened to be a working replica of a pioneer village; and one of the manned displays she observed was a silversmith shop.

The woman watched the silversmith as he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He then explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were the hottest, in order to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; and then she recalled the verse which says, “He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.”

She then asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered yes; that he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left even a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.

The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, “How do you know when the silver is fully refined?” He smiled at her and answered, “Oh that’s easy, when I see my own image in it.”(1)

On that thought, let us now stand in honor of the reading of God’s Word found in Ezekiel 22:17-22.

Introduction to God’s Refining Fire (Ezekiel 22:17-22)

17 The word of the Lord came to me, saying, 18 “Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to Me; they are all bronze, tin, iron, and lead, in the midst of a furnace; they have become dross from silver.” 19 Therefore thus says the Lord God: “Because you have all become dross, therefore behold, I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem. 20 As men gather silver, bronze, iron, lead, and tin into the midst of a furnace, to blow fire on it, to melt it; so I will gather you in My anger and in My fury, and I will leave you there and melt you. 21 Yes, I will gather you and blow on you with the fire of My wrath, and you shall be melted in its midst. 22 As silver is melted in the midst of a furnace, so shall you be melted in its midst; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have poured out My fury on you.”

Ezekiel was describing the nation of Israel during the Babylonian exile of 587 B.C. Israel had gone astray from the Lord by worshiping foreign gods and idols. Because the people would not repent and turn to the Lord, God allowed the holy city of Jerusalem to be invaded by the Babylonians and the inhabitants of the city to be taken captive. The Lord spoke to Ezekiel and revealed that the Babylonian exile was a process of purification of the nation of Israel, and His means of purification was similar to that used of a refiner of precious metals.

The process of refining metals, described very simply without all the complicated details, works like this: A silversmith or goldsmith unloads ore in a large cauldron called a crucible, or smelter, and the ore is melted down. As the ore melts, all the impurities and worthless metals such as bronze, tin, iron, and lead, which are called dross, float to the top and are either burned off or skimmed off.(2)

In this passage Ezekiel was describing the Babylonian exile as the melting down of Israel and the separation of the godly (the silver) from the unrighteous (the dross). Ezekiel saw those who were taken into captivity as people who were being set apart as fine silver. They were separated from the dross of the idol worshippers and polytheists, and they would one day return to Jerusalem as true worshippers of God alone.

Those who escaped being taken captive, and who remained in Jerusalem, continued worshipping foreign gods and idols. They were seen as dross in the eyes of the Lord to be consumed by fire, and the walls of Jerusalem were as the walls on a refiner’s crucible. The people remaining in Jerusalem would be burned spiritually by the heat of God’s judgement.(3) The prophet Jeremiah spoke of the remaining inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, “The bellows blow fiercely, the lead is consumed by the fire; the smelter refines in vain, for the wicked are not drawn off. People will call them rejected silver, because the Lord has rejected them” (Jeremiah 6:29-30).

The Purpose of God’s Refining Fire

Ezekiel described the Babylonian exile as being a refiner’s fire; so what was its spiritual purpose? There is a praise song by Brian Doerksen entitled, “Refiner’s Fire,” which provides us with an idea of what it was all about. This song says, “Purify my heart, let me be as gold and precious silver . . . Refiner’s fire; my heart’s one desire is to be holy, set apart for you my Master, ready to do your will.”